Keep the Change
by truhekili
Summary: Begins around the beginning of season 6, but a few months after Izzie's funeral. Alex/Meredith. Six chapters. Complete, but may have a sequel. I own nothing, and earn nothing from this story.
1. Chapter 1

"Keep the change," the cheery brunette giggled, brushing her curly hair over her shoulder as she casually tossed a 20 dollar bill onto the bar. Alex nodded curtly, stuffing 17 dollars into the cash register and shoving 3 in his pocket. He hadn't seen her before, but the place teemed with new people since the merger, most of them after his job.

"Go home, Ray's here," Joe called from behind him. "You want me to call Mere?"

"I had two beers," Alex snorted. "Think I can make it."

"Right," Joe smirked, signaling Ray to take over the register as he pulled out his phone.

"Mere's on until midnight," Alex noted, almost wincing. He'd forgotten that, again, when he drove in to the hospital with her that morning, trying to save on gas money.

"I can take you," Jenny broke in, folding her apron as she grabbed her bag. "I'm going that way anyway."

"I don't need-" Alex started, avoiding Joe's look.

"Jen or Mere" Joe insisted, motioning toward the server he'd hired a few weeks before as he flipped his phone open. "I can't take you tonight."

"Whatever," Alex grumbled, following Jen to her car. She'd flirted with him once or twice, the way bar maids did, out of habit mostly. He'd seen it all before.

"You're a doctor, right?" she asked, minutes into the drive.

"Um-huh," he agreed absently, as he watched the light snow blanketing the road under the streetlights. That was one point in her favor; she didn't know she was supposed to feel sorry for him. He might even have looked twice, but her eyes were too brown, and her hair was too blonde, and she chattered about everything, even her horoscope.

"So how come you work in a bar?" she asked casually.

"This is good," he said, popping his door open as she rolled up to a stop sign.

"What?" she asked suddenly. "I thought you lived-"

"Yeah, this is fine," he cut her off, closing the door before she could say another word. He was vaguely familiar with the neighborhood, and walked until he saw the darkened house, his numb fingers groping for his keys. Slamming the door shut behind him, he sat heavily on the floor. He'd go upstairs tonight, he'd promised himself; he'd go this time, when his legs were less rubbery, after he'd caught his breath.

* * *

_Change is good_, Meredith muttered to herself through clenched teeth, parking her car in front of the house as Muriel Swenson's latest lecture echoed through her mind. _She's as bad as my mother_, she continued, cursing the new Head of Neurosurgery, and the merger, and Dr. Wyatt's advice at her last session, as she navigated the slippery walkway.

Change is good. Meredith repeated Wyatt's phrase like a mantra as she climbed the stairs, shaking the fall's early snowfall off her brown wool coat while she fumbled for her house keys. Pushing the heavy front door open, she cursed Joe for forgetting to lock it behind him, and for leaving Alex in the hall where she could trip over him, again.

Joe probably hadn't been there that evening, though, she realized a moment later, since the bar would still be open, and Alex was half covered with melting ice crystals, which were dripping on the hallway floor, where he slumped awkwardly under the coat rack.

Grumbling to herself, she half pulled, half pushed him into the den, wondering if it was just as well that she wasn't sure how he'd gotten there, and whether he was too drunk, or too tired, or just too cold to notice what she was doing. _Change is good_, she repeated wryly, echoing Wyatt's insistence, as she ransacked the cluttered closet.

Peeling off his soaked clothes, she winced at the chill of his clammy grey skin. It would embarrass a normal person, she imagined, to be unwrapped like a dead fish on the faded oriental rug, even in the dimly lit room. But they were both doctors, and they'd seen it all before, often enough to no longer notice much of anything.

Hastily bundling two blankets around him, she moved his sopping jacket aside, almost jumping as a few coins tumbled out of his pocket, clattering onto the floor. _Change is good_, she repeated, as she sat back against the wall, watching an errant dime spin wildly before settling into place. It was probably his food money for the month, she thought, as she tallied the thirty seven cents, or his tips from tending Joe's bar that night.

The coins settled near his right hand, his fingers still bare, though she knew he was still paying for the ring he buried Izzie with. It was absurd, really, how he scoured the city the day after she died, as if finding the perfect wedding band could bring her back to life. That was crazy, since Izzie was the only one of them who ever believed in miracles.

He was still shivering slightly, and she reached quickly for another blanket from the pile, throwing it over him as she ran her hand lightly across his back. It would be her luck, for him to freeze to death in her well heated house, under a mound of down. People died on her like that all the time: they got hiccups, or moles, or got hit by busses.

She could get him dry clothes, she thought idly, so he'd at least be dressed if another hearse came. But she'd have to go upstairs for that, where Izzie's laughter still echoed through the hall, and the tee shirts Derek left behind still lurked in her closet, beside her simple black dress, and boxes of her mother's journals, all in her freaking haunted house.

Change is good, she'd insisted, when Derek swapped the Range Rover for a BMW, and the trailer for a Chicago high rise, after the merger, and his failed bid for Chief; after Izzie died on his operating table, and they'd gone to too many funerals.

She'd repeated it for a month afterward, until Cristina swapped her Moped for a moving van, and pulled away with Owen, to San Francisco Memorial. It was absurd, really, that Cristina Yang surrendered her job and her apartment and her friends to follow a man she barely knew to who knows where, for who knows what.

Pulling a blanket around herself, she sat back against the wall, away from the ghosts upstairs, weighing just how absurd it was to almost envy them: Cristina, still tangling with Owen's demons amid the Bay area's fog, and Alex, the world's least likely widower, who slept slumped under a coat rack, with thirty seven cents to his name.

* * *

"I didn't think they were that important," Meredith admitted three days later, almost cringing as she piled hot stringy cheese back onto her pizza. She couldn't quite make out his expression in the shadowy room, but she could feel the anger radiating from him as he plucked his own slice from the box, settling back against the wall with a bottle of beer.

Change is good, she reminded herself, as she warily surveyed her cavernous new condo, with exposed brick walls, and polished cement floors, and three gas fireplaces, including one in each bedroom, and modern bathrooms that would never house claw foot bath tubs.

"I could try to get them back," she volunteered hesitantly. "But I think the salvage company cleared everything out already," she added, as if noticing it for the first time: She'd left almost everything but their clothes behind, even the ornate antique coat rack, and the guitar he never played, and Derek's tee shirts, and the trophies that always stood on Alex's windowsill, and which he apparently still wanted.

"No kidding," he snorted, vaguely motioning around the empty condo, where they ate pizza by streetlight on the floor, under the exposed metal duct work. "You could have at least told me," he growled, between huge bites of crust.

_That was true_, she thought. She could have said something about selling her mother's house, before she piled his stuff in with hers, and moved it to the converted warehouse across from the hospital, stuffing the new keys and address into his locker without a word. But he'd worked double shifts the last two days, and stayed at the hospital the whole time, and she doubted he'd miss her mother's house any more than she would.

"You hate change," she muttered between bites.

"Does this place even have electricity?" he asked incredulously.

"We have electricity," she confirmed. "We just don't have light bulbs yet."

"The salvage company took them?" he asked sarcastically.

"And the beds," she called after him, as he scooped up the empty pizza box and paper plates and tossed them into the garbage, with the toilet paper they had used instead of napkins. She'd sold it all, curtains, furniture, silverware. She had to; it was haunted.

"I left your sleeping bag on the floor." she noted. "I'm off tomorrow. If you really want me to try and get them-"

"Just get some light bulbs, okay?" he grumbled tiredly, tossing his sleeping bag to her before retreating back into his own almost empty room.

She bought a television the following day, and light bulbs, and ordered new furniture, and scrounged up some towels. She didn't do domestic, and she doubted he noticed, anyway, since he still ate his cereal out of the box, and dried his milk glass on his shirt.

_Izzie would have killed him by now if he did that in her kitchen_, she thought more than once that week, halting the words before they tumbled out.

She wondered if it was easier for cancer to have taken Izzie from him, before she could walk away of her own accord, like Derek had. It was absurd, she knew, to almost envy the certainty of their dissolution; it was even crazier, how much she resented him for it, for having some lame excuse, at least, for why Izzie left him behind.

"Big spender," she teased, the following week, noting the second pudding on his lunch tray. She knew it bugged him that he was still scrounging for money, and would've been living in his car without her. That made the jabs harder to resist.

"Hungry," he grumbled, shrugging as he poked warily at the green blob on his plate.

"Are you on a case with Bailey?" she asked, pondering what the day's vegetable was.

"Huh?" Alex asked, spearing part of the blob with his fork. "No. Palmer."

"She was looking for you earlier," Meredith noted.

"She asked me if I wanted to go back to Peds," he shrugged.

"Do you?" Meredith asked, sniffing suspiciously at what she thought were string beans.

"You too?" he snorted. He'd heard that all before. The snickers from the nurses, the taunts from Sloan and Yang, even Izzie had chimed in.

"You always seemed to like it better," she said, shrugging casually. "And you're always complaining about Palmer."

"He's a-" Alex interrupted, wide-eyed.

"A jack ass," Meredith filled in from rote, almost laughing. "I've heard. Heard he yelled at you again today in the O.R.," she added quietly.

"Bailey tell you that, too?" he growled.

"No," she admitted. "I over-heard some of the scrub nurses talking. They hate him, too. Apparently he was no more popular when he was the head of Ortho at Mercy West."

"He's a rock star," Alex insisted smugly.

"Carpentry," she crooned, echoing one of Cristina's favorite digs.

"You sleep with the new Neuro Attending yet?" he smirked, ignoring her commentary as he pulled the lid off his first pudding.

"She's a girl," Meredith reminded him, rolling her eyes.

"Cool," he smirked. "Can I watch?"

"No," she retorted, "you'll be doing your carpentry. Really," she continued curiously, watching as he devoured a pear, "what's with all the time you're doing on Palmer's service? You always said Ortho was boring when we did our intern rotations."

"I like it," he snapped, jabbing at his pudding. "It's not baby catching, it's not the gynie squad, it's hardcore."

"You could switch back, you know," she said quietly, in that tone he loathed. "Bailey would understand, even the Chief would understand. You just weren't yourself after-"

"This has nothing to do with Izzie," he hissed, deliberately lowering his voice.

"Okay, okay," she insisted, shaking her head. "But we'll be applying for fellowships next year," she reminded him quietly. "We can't waste time-"

"You going for Swenson?" he asked, inhaling the rest of his pudding. .

"I don't know," Meredith hesitated, toying with the papers near her tray as Alex eyed her closely, half frowning.

"I know," she exhaled. "But I'm also thinking about Neurology." _Or anything else_, she sometimes thought, to get away from Muriel Swenson.

"Huh?" Alex asked, baffled.

"I've been thinking about my mother a lot lately," she said. "It destroyed her life, the Alzheimer's, and no one's doing anything about it."

"She's dead," he reminded her bluntly.

"I know that," she snapped. "But so many other people-"

"You showing early signs?" he taunted.

"You're the one showing early signs," Meredith retorted, rolling her eyes.

"You're a surgeon," he insisted, shaking his head. "You cut."

"Like my mother?" she demanded.

"What's wrong with that?" he snorted. "She was a rock star."

"She was…" Meredith retorted, her voice dropping off as she glared at him. "You're telling me I should be like my mother?"

"You already are," he pointed out.

"That," she snapped, pointing her plastic fork at him, "that's why you're Evil Spawn."

"Right," he nodded, piling his trash on his tray and grabbing his folders. "You're a surgeon," he repeated. "You don't baby sit doddering-"

"It's not like a broken bone, you know," she insisted, gathering her things and stalking after him. "Surgery can't fix everything. It's a brain thing. It's more complicated."

"That's the beauty of Ortho," he smirked. "Patch 'em up and move 'em out."

"Oh," Meredith taunted, "the famed Karev compassion makes an appearance."

"Stick with Swenson," he grumbled, "even if she won't sleep with you."

"Don't leave any hammers in your patients," she called after him, emptying her tray as she watched him walk away.

--------------

_She thought surgeons who used staples were lazy_, Alex remembered, watching idly as Dr. Palmer cleaned and re-checked the open wound, preparing to close along the medial side. _She would've hated this_, he thought with a frown.

"Dr, Karev," the senior Orthopedic Attending repeated sharply, drawing Alex's attention suddenly back to the operating room, "are you planning on removing that retractor now, or should I just staple right over it?"

"No, no, sir," Alex protested, hastily pulling the instrument back as the impatient surgeon glared at him over his mask.

"You have something more interesting you're day-dreaming about there, Karev?" he demanded as he finished his work. "Care to share it with the rest of the class?"

"No sir," Alex stammered, forcing his attention back to the surgery. It was at least the tenth knee replacement he'd scrubbed in on over the past two weeks, and still he did nothing but hold retractors.

_At least he doesn't make me pick up his dry cleaning_, Alex muttered hours later, as he filled in the routine post- op diagrams. _It's not even carpentry_, he grumbled, as he dropped onto an on call room bed somewhere around three the following morning; it was more like factory work, the kind losers like his father did, if they could hold jobs at all.

Jolted by the shrill beep of his pager a few hours later, he fumbled for it too quickly, cursing as it clattered across the floor. Scooping it up at a run, he charged up to the patient's room, relieved to find Palmer already there.

"Dr. Karev," Palmer noted, eying Alex suspiciously as he arrived out of breath, "did you bring Mr. Jensen's latest films?"

"Um, uh, no," Alex said, turning to leave. "I'll go get them now." Retrieving the thick binder from the Nurses' station, he returned to the room, listening as Palmer reviewed the surgery's results and out-lined the patient's remaining course of treatment.

"Dr. Karev will go over the specifics with you, and we'll see that you're discharged with a complete post-operative plan. Isn't that right, Dr. Karev?" Palmer asked abruptly.

"Yeah, yeah," Alex agreed, struggling to clear his head as he looked the chart over. The surgeries he'd been on over the past few weeks were all blurring together, and he'd been on-call for the last four nights, and he was starting to see knee replacements in his sleep.

"Fine." Palmer noted, turning to leave. "Dr. Karev," he added, under his breath, "when you're through here, I need to speak with you in my office."

"Yeah, okay," Alex nodded, shaking off his distraction as he went on to explain the next few steps to Mr. Jensen and his nervous, high strung wife. Twenty five minutes later, he sat impatiently in Palmer's office, waiting to hear what he'd done wrong this time.

"Dr. Karev," Palmer began, finally hanging up his phone and leaning back in his desk chair, "I realize it's early, but have you given much thought to the Fellowship application process yet?"

"No, uh, not yet," Alex admitted, his eyes nervously scanning the office, stacked floor to ceiling with files, and over flowing with ceramic models of joints and muscles, and three half assembled skeletons strewn in a garish heap, like a Halloween prank gone awry.

"You're planning on applying here next year?" Palmer noted coolly, more as a statement then a question.

"Yes," Alex agreed.

"Of course," Palmer acknowledged. "But you understand that we have a number of fine Residents who are already quite committed to developing my department's reputation as a premier provider of total joint replacements."

"We're all interested in that, sir" Alex agreed, barely hiding his puzzlement. Palmer had made his ambitious plans well known to anyone who would listen, from the moment he'd joined Seattle Grace in the merger, along with several of his senior colleagues. He was a rock star, and definitely hard core; it was the only thing about him that Alex could stand.

"Yes, but as I was saying, some of my Residents have worked with me longer, they know my expectations, and to be honest," he added quietly, handing Alex a thick file folder, "I think you would also be well served to consider some of these other opportunities."

Alex nodded blankly, taking the folder.

"I'll write you an excellent recommendation," Palmer added. "And this by no means indicates that you shouldn't apply here when the time comes. I'm just suggesting that-"

"There are people here you'd rather have more," Alex noted bluntly.

"Dr. Karev," Palmer interrupted uncomfortably, clearing his throat, "I understand that it's been difficult for you, with the merger, and your wife-"

"Leave her out of it," Alex hissed, so coldly that Palmer leaned back abruptly.

"I just meant-" the older doctor began.

"I get it," Alex interrupted, gripping the folder tightly as he rose from his chair and stalked toward the door. "I'll let you know," Alex added, without turning back, "where to send the recommendation letters."

"That's fine," Palmer called, still seated at his desk as Alex closed the door behind him.

Finishing his shift in a blur, Alex returned home just after midnight. He wasn't being fired, he was just… he was… _He could still change Palmer's mind_, he thought wildly, he could do better, he still had time, if only he could…Retreating to his room, he paced, too tired to sleep, and enraged all over again that she'd left his trophies behind.

He'd earned them, he'd won something, once; he'd done something right, once, before it all went wrong again; he'd even had proof. Dropping onto his rumpled bed, he glared at the empty windowsill. He'd earned them. He ignored the idiot coach screaming in his ear that he'd never take first place in his weight class; he'd just run further, and lifted more, and fought harder, and he'd earned them. He could do that again, he insisted. He should have seen it coming, anyway, since he'd seen it all before.

* * *

"Next time, you pick," Meredith insisted a few weeks later, watching as he unwrapped his hamburger. "At least it was half price," she reminded him as she sat at the food court table. Wednesday movies at the Mall Cinema were always half price; it was the only way he'd go. Lately, it was one of the few ways to get him out of the hospital at all.

"Whatever," he grumbled, roughly pulling the pickles from his hamburger, and placing them on hers. His ears were still ringing, and he wondered how she could even follow the damn plot with so many idiots yelling their heads off all around them in the theater.

"I can't believe you don't like Slasher movies," she protested, piling the pickles more neatly as she reached for a napkin.

"Who said I don't like Slasher movies?" he retorted. "I just-"

"You kept looking away," she laughed. "You're such a baby."

"I wasn't looking away," he snorted. "It was boring."

"Right," she nodded skeptically. "So next week, you pick. Maybe they'll be playing a nice Disney movie," she added, wrinkling her nose at him.

"Back to your Snow White fantasies again?" he taunted, as he slurped his drink.

"Well," she retorted tartly, "I do live with Grumpy."

"Just because you can't pick a decent movie…" he growled, shoveling French fries into his mouth. "I like serial killers," he added smugly.

"Oh," Meredith teased, giggling, "so you just didn't like this particular serial killer?"

"Couldn't root for him," Alex insisted, shaking his head vigorously as he slurped his soda again. "He reminded me of Palmer, sloppy cutter."

"You're comparing your Attending to a serial killer," Meredith noted, raising her eye brows at him as she wiped her fingers.

"He's a…" Alex retorted, shaking his head as he stared back down at his empty tray. He hadn't told her. It didn't matter. He was going to change the jack ass's mind.

"You're just sulking because he won't let you do anything," Meredith insisted, gathering her things as she stood to leave.

"Right, like Swenson's so much better?" Alex smirked, following behind her as they exited the food court.

"I have an early surgery tomorrow," she corrected, pushing him toward the car. "At least Swenson actually lets me do things," she added, "besides hold retractors."

"Yea, paperwork and photo copying," he taunted. "You're a secretary."

"Shut up," she huffed, swatting his arm. "We're doing a tumor resection and shunt placement. She'll probably publish an article on it. You're just jealous," she teased, shrugging her coat off into his hands as he hung it with his beside the entry door.

"Palmer will cave," Alex insisted, shaking his head as he went into the living room. "And when he does, I'll be an Ortho rock star."

"Not again," she grumbled, handing him a beer and dropping onto the couch as he scanned the channels for the old sitcoms he watched when football wasn't on. "They're never going to get off that island, you know," she said, pointing her bottle at the screen.

"Oh, they'll get back," he insisted, nodding his head seriously and wincing as Gilligan toppled unceremoniously into the lagoon, before he flipped through the channels again.

"The Munsters?" she scoffed.

"Nothing else on," he shrugged, the light from the fireplace she'd just lit casting a shadow over him as evening settled into the room.

"Admit it, you have a thing for Marilyn Munster," she taunted, motioning to the busty blonde on the screen.

"Right," he smirked, sipping his own bottle.

"I always liked Morticia Adams better," she noted smugly.

"Remind you of your mother?" he taunted.

"I wish," Meredith grumbled, eying the barren mantle above the giant fireplace. She'd volunteered to work for the rest of the week, happily switching shifts with people who wanted Thanksgiving off. She'd always spent holidays in the hospital, waiting for her mother. It was what surgeons did, her mother always said. They were dedicated, they knew what was important, and they didn't waste time on trivia.

_Izzie would hate this_, she observed idly, surveying the room, which bore no trace of the holidays. _It would have been their first Christmas together_, she thought, glancing at Alex as she imaged Izzie decorating Ellis' old house, cancer be damned, and filling brightly colored stockings on the mantle – an activity Ellis would have hated on principle - and driving Alex and everyone else crazy.

_Everyone except Derek_, she thought abruptly.

"He's probably already shopping for his nieces and nephews," Meredith muttered, sighing at the sight of a sappy Christmas car commercial. "He's got like fifty of them, and he picks something out for each one of them. Who can even learn that many names?"

"His new girl friend, maybe" Alex noted bluntly, hoping to shut her up. He'd heard this all before, and he hated when she went on and on about that loser. As if she hadn't seen it coming when the bastard was sniffing around after that stupid nurse or his hot ex, as if she should have expected anything else.

"He wraps them himself, too. I'm a terrible wrapper," she rambled. "My mother never saw the point. She wouldn't even let me wait up for Santa. She said if he was that fat he probably had arteriosclerosis, and would have an elevated stroke risk."

"She said that?" Alex noted, with an admiring nod.

"I was five," Meredith protested. "Who talks like that to a five year old?"

"Didn't she give you that ugly doll in your locker?" he asked, scowling.

"Yeah," she sighed, "probably something she picked up last minute at the hospital gift shop."

"So, what, she was supposed to lie to you, about some fat dude coming down your chimney and flying around with freaking reindeer?" Alex asked.

"Oh," she objected, "they didn't have Santa in Iowa?"

"Just corn," Alex insisted, shaking his head.

"You never waited up for Santa when you were a kid?" she teased.

"Lived with him," he shrugged. "My dad was a rent-a-Santa to make extra money."

"At least you got to see him," she noted wistfully.

"Thought he was a nasty drunk," Alex corrected. "Couldn't figure out why anyone would wait up for him."

"We're not doing this right," she insisted, shaking her head as she vaguely surveyed the room again. "We need to do something for Thanksgiving."

"On call," Alex noted smugly, finishing his beer.

"Yeah, me too" Meredith admitted, "for the rest of the week. But I can at least learn how to wrap presents," she insisted.

"Why don't you just suture?" he suggested.

"What?" she asked, not sure she heard him right.

"Put some medi-gauze around whatever you're wrapping and suture," he noted, as if it were perfectly obvious. "You know how to suture, right?" he added sarcastically.

"Medi-gauze and 3-0 silk, to wrap a present?" she repeated incredulously, rolling her eyes at him. "You're worse then my mother."

"She," he reminded her, rising from the couch to retrieve two more beers for them, "was a rock star."


	2. Chapter 2

"What's that smell?" Alex asked, weeks later, scowling as he rushed into the kitchen, strewn with bowls and spoons, and a half dozen baking sheets harboring the charred remains of what he gathered were supposed to be snowman sugar cookies, in various stages of decomposition. It looked like the scene of a mass trauma.

"Want me to call 9-1-1?" he taunted, motioning toward the unfortunate gingerbread men she was rolling out. "Those look like some nasty amputations."

"Not funny," she snapped, pointing her rolling pin at him. "These will be-"

"Crippled for life," he observed bluntly, "if they're not DOA."

"If you're not going to help," she protested, wiping her hands on a festive dish towel as she slid another tray into the oven, "you can leave."

"Help what?" he asked, "test the sprinkler system? Really," he continued, looking around suspiciously, "how come the smoke detectors didn't go off?"

"They did, an hour ago" she admitted sheepishly, pointing to the batteries on the counter, "but only for the first batch."

Alex stepped warily toward the kitchen island, poking hesitantly at one of the earlier batches. "You're not bringing these-" he started.

"To the Christmas cookie exchange at the hospital?" she asked. "I might."

"What happened to first, do no harm?" he scowled.

"What happened to minding your own freaking business in my house?" she snapped, pulling her cook book closer as she scanned the ingredient list. "This is one of Izzie's recipes. I'm just trying to…"she noted, stopping short just as suddenly.

"Izzie wouldn't burn the block down trying to bake cookies," he snapped, glaring at her.

"She wouldn't sulk on the couch like a spoiled two year old, either," Meredith retorted, adding two more eggs to the yellow bowl in front of her and stirring it furiously. "It's almost Christmas," she added harshly. "She'd want us to celebrate the freaking holiday."

"Celebrate what?" he sneered. "Toy making fairies? Drunken fat guys in red suits?"

"Elves," Meredith corrected sharply, pounding her cookie dough into lopsided lumps and searching through her new collection of cookie cutters, "not fairies, elves. Have you seen the ones to make stars, or bells?" she demanded. "They always make stars and bells."

"They?" he echoed, baffled.

"They," she repeated harshly. "Normal people. People who bake cookies, people who wrap presents, people who take their kids to see Santa Claus and watch sappy movies, people who don't volunteer to work on Christmas while their kids wait for them to bring home some crappy toy from the hospital gift shop…"she shook her head, tipping over the bowl and pounding the dough out flat on the counter.

"I'm not wasting another Christmas," she insisted, slamming a heavy spoon into an over flowing bowl with a definitive clang. "And you can play this pathetic widower crap all you want, but you're not ruining my holiday, too."

He'd already taken off by the time she looked up, to the hospital, she imagined, or to Joe's, or to the gym. She knew she pushed him too far sometimes, but he was right in front of her, and Ellis and Derek – and Dr. Wyatt - weren't, and he was stuck until he could scrounge up the money to move, and she'd already had enough of his two week sham of a marriage to last a lifetime.

Bitterly shaking her head, she continued her baking, wondering why Izzie always found it therapeutic rather than enraging, and if her mother had the scrub nurses pick out the crappy toys from the gift shop, and if Derek had finished his wrapping, and why her stars were missing points, and her bells were lop sided, and her snowmen looked sun burned.

She left a few cookies on the counter, anyway, though he was on-call for the rest of the week. It was all just as well, she imagined the following day, when she dragged in the small artificial tree she'd bought, which came fully decorated right out of the box, and hung a reindeer stocking on the mantle, under some candles. It wasn't much, but enough to at least show that it was December, and that the condo was inhabited.

She worked the next two days, eating lunch with Alex mostly in gruff silence, though she did leave two pears in his locker for the following day, when she'd be off. She listened vaguely as people chatted about holiday plans, and smiled politely when they asked what she was doing, and breathed a sigh of relief that she was working during the staff party.

_But Change is good_, she reminded herself, as she wandered through a teeming mall the day before Christmas, clutching a holiday music CD in her bag. Sipping her hot chocolate on a wooden bench near the center fountain, she watched excited children pulling their weary parents toward the toy stores, or to see Santa, and wondered again if Derek had finished his wrapping, and if it was snowing in Connecticut, where he'd no doubt take his new girlfriend to meet his family, where they'd all pose for a Norman Rockwell portrait.

Twenty minutes later she was sizing up gingerbread man dish towels in a nearby linens shop when she spotted them- red plaid flannel sheets, with a thick matching comforter. They were marked seventy five percent off, and labeled slightly imperfect. Smirking at the patent understatement, she scooped them up and headed for the register.

She left the label on them as she wrapped the package that night, wrinkling the paper as she went; she'd never intended to get Alex a present, but this she couldn't resist, and he needed sheets anyway, since he still used his sleeping bag, spread sloppily atop the bed she'd gotten for his room the week she ordered furniture for the condo.

_So many details to moving_, she remembered with a grimace, silverware, paper towels napkins, light bulbs. _Who would even think of light bulbs_, she recalled protesting to him that first night, as they sat in the darkness and split the last pizza slice down the middle with a box cutter. The answer was obvious to both of them; neither said a word about it.

She knew he was working the next two days, but she set the bulky package under the tree anyway, before leaving for Lexi and Mark's place. She was grateful, suddenly, that she'd accepted their party invitation for the evening. It would be overrun by the new Residents, but she imagined she'd seem less screwed up to Dr. Wyatt if she had something to do.

She had a better time than she expected, and arrived home much later then she planned, and went straight to bed. Rising late the next morning, she turned on the parade, and lit the gas fireplace to ward off the chill that had blanketed Seattle that week.

Settling back into the couch, she noticed that Alex's present was missing, and that the stocking she'd hung over the mantle slumped sloppily under the tree. Peeking into his room, she saw that his bed was newly made up, in rumpled red plaid.

Setting her stocking on the couch, she peered suspiciously inside, and pulled out a lump of medical gauze, sutured around a heavy glass canister. Smirking wryly, she undid the wrapping, and found a batch of dry cookie mix, and a small set of tin cutters, complete with a Baking for Dummies pamphlet.

She found a small plush frog, too - from the hospital gift shop, she imagined – and a pair of brown leather gloves. Running her fingers lightly over the soft fabric, she wondered how he found the right size, and when he got them, since he'd been working nearly non-stop for the past week, and why he even had a sleeping bag in the first place, since the closest he'd ever get to camping was watching re-runs of Gilligan's Island.

------------------

He hated Christmas, but Mere'd been right about one thing: Izzie would have expected more from him. She would have expected him to know how to pick presents, and how to wrap, and to bring their kids to see Santa Claus; she would have expected a wreath on the door, and a huge tree in the corner, like in the sappy movies that she watched. She would have expected her own freaking White Christmas; she would never have settled for less.

Walking briskly through the chilly afternoon breeze, he pulled his coat collar up around him, almost shivering as he disappeared into the bustling crowd on the sidewalk. He hated malls, hated the garish displays, the explosions of tinsel and glitter, the fake snow, the forced cheer, the little blonde girls in red party dresses, who all looked like her.

Ducking into an entryway, he blew on his blistering hands, rubbing them together to get some feeling back. He ignored the excited children lining up beside the minimum wage elves and the plywood reindeer. His mother hated Christmas, too, he remembered, when the bars were open later then usual, and the rowdy rent-a-Santas packed in by nine.

Stopping at a bewildering booth of baking supplies, he debated briefly, smirking as he hefted the Child's First Christmas Cookie Mix Kit from the shelf. People like them didn't do holidays; if the smoke alarm wasn't proof enough, nothing was.

Returning to the hospital, he stashed the bag in his locker, and began his second shift, scrambling to catch up with his charting, and to research a procedure Palmer would be doing the following week. He was still charting late that evening, after hours in the pit, when he wandered down to the almost empty cafeteria, eating as he continued his work.

She'd still be mad at him, he knew, and it was her place, but the on call rooms would be mostly empty, too, so at least he had somewhere to stay. It was just as well anyway, since he couldn't afford to get any further behind, and Palmer was always waiting for him to screw up, and he really needed to do something soon to set himself apart from the other Residents on Palmer's service.

Dumping his tray, he doubled back through the hospital's main walkway, stopping briefly to notice the snow flickering past the huge arched windows, and the blinking lights of the towering Christmas tree in the atrium, illuminating the darkened stairwells. _Iz would have stopped here to watch_, he imagined, shaking his head as he hurried on his way.

He found two pears in his locker later the next day, along with a few snowman cookies that weren't remotely edible, and wondered briefly what she was doing over the next few days, since she hadn't volunteered to take holiday shifts, the way she usually did. He wondered if she was blowing any more time on that loser in Chicago, or if she might go away somewhere, or if she was home channeling Izzie in another bizarre baking ritual.

He wondered why she'd bothered to stop by their lockers, since she wasn't working, and why she was leaving him pears instead of apples, though he'd recently begun to prefer them, and if she ever put the batteries back in the smoke detectors. He wondered that again later that afternoon, when he trudged back to the mall, recalling how especially annoying malls were when you had no idea what you were looking for.

Stepping out of the brisk wind again, he remembered that her hands were always cold, and that she always wore that brown wool coat when it snowed, and that it didn't have any pockets as far as he could tell, and that surgeons should always protect their hands; he found them on the third try, guessing they'd need to be small, and narrow, and look like her coat or she'd never wear them, and wrapped, because he was already almost late for his next shift, and he'd never figure out how to cover up the weird stuffed frog that came attached to them, apparently to push some environmentalist crusade.

Stopping by briefly between shifts, he set her bundle under the ugly little tree that sprung up inexplicably in the living room, and was perplexed when he saw a bulky package with his name. It was technically Christmas, since it was past midnight, and it was wrapped as if it'd been bounced down some stairs, but the imperfect plaid sheets looked fine to him, and the comforter actually covered the whole bed, unlike his sleeping bag.

Rolling up his old sleeping bag, he stashed it on the top shelf in his closet; it was faded and threadbare in a few spots, but had come in handy when he stayed in the back room of Joe's bar. He imagined Joe's would be packed that night, and wondered if maybe she'd gone there, and if the weird baking thing had finally given way to Tequila.

Making his way back to the hospital, he spent the next two days in the pit, suturing up the usual out-pouring of holiday cheer. It all ran together in one big welcomed blur, since he was too busy to think, and too distracted to notice, much, how Palmer's other Residents got all the best surgeries, while he was still seeing knee replacements in his sleep.

* * *

"Dr. Grey," rang the clipped voice behind her, "have you finished Mr. Trenton's chart yet?"

"No, no," Meredith stammered, her heart racing as she gathered the heavy clipboards she'd nearly dropped all over the gleaming floors. "We just finished his surgery two hours ago, Dr. Swenson," she reminded the Chief of Neurosurgery as her throat ran dry. "I was working on it right now."

Swenson pushed her eye glasses on, her graceful hands as exacting as they were in her operating room. Taking the chart, she opened it briskly as Meredith watched, shifting nervously on her feet as she waited. Glancing down, she focused on the woman's impeccably polished shoes. She'd completed more than a hundred surgeries with Swenson, and was sure she'd never seen a spot, even on the woman's surgical scrubs.

"Dr. Grey," Swenson demanded, "are you planning to record the patient's T-wave patterns for the past twelve hours?"

"Yes, of course," Meredith replied quickly. "As soon as I-"

"And why would you do that?" Swenson challenged, as if the information were as relevant as the day's football scores to the patient's treatment protocol.

"To assess stroke risk," Meredith volunteered, almost hesitantly, "and to decide the next course of action if-"

"And what would that be," Swenson prodded, shutting the chart, "if the wave rate were 7.2.?"

The question was hypothetical, Meredith realized, since Mr. Trenton's patterns weren't nearly that extreme. _She's asking about the worst case scenario_, she thought, _if _–

"Dr. Grey," the woman interrupted, "surely you've considered that possibility while you were writing this chart?"

"Not exactly," she admitted. "I mean, I would have, after I finished up-dating my notes on this morning's tumor resection, and the shunt removal-" That was her job, of course, to imagine the worst case scenarios, to always see them coming. It's what surgeons did.

"Dr. Grey," Swenson interrupted sternly, and sizing her up with a fixed stare, "are you serious about Neurosurgery?"

"What?" Meredith stammered. "Yes, of course."

"Well, I'll only remind you of this once" she noted, adjusting her already perfectly placed glasses. "I didn't select you for my service. I inherited you, from Dr. Shepherd. I'm sure he's a fine surgeon," Swenson continued somewhat dismissively. "But your preparation is somewhat lacking for a third year Resident."

Meredith nodded slowly, holding her breath. They were all the same, Attendings like Swenson, each miserable in his or her own way, and determined to spread it around. That was how Attendings worked; she'd known that since she was five years old.

"However, you are a Grey," Swenson noted, eying Meredith closely, "and that certainly carries some weight with me."

Meredith nodded again, swallowing almost audibly.

"I do, though," Swenson insisted, motioning to the sloppy pile of charts, "have certain expectations of you because of that. Do you understand?" she asked seriously.

"Yes, yes, I think so," Meredith responded, somewhat uncertainly.

"I don't think you do," Swenson corrected, shaking her head, her precisely cut hair falling flawlessly into place. "I expect you to be the best in your cohort. I expect you to want to be the best. Do you?" she asked, lowering her voice ominously.

"Dr. Swenson?" Meredith repeated, not sure she understood the question.

"Are you prepared to put in the work that will take?" Swenson demanded.

"Of course," Meredith said, nodding as she exhaled. "I want to be-"

"Then start acting like it," Swenson demanded, slamming the chart back down on the hard surface with a thud and turning on her heel.

Meredith was still trembling slightly as Swenson walked away, and was too clumsy as she tried to restack the charts more neatly, and too distracted to hear her the first time, when Bailey sauntered up behind her.

"She told you," Bailey noted approvingly as Meredith looked up, wide eyed.

"She sounds just like my mother," Meredith grimaced, shaking her head.

"Your mother was a-" Bailey started.

"I know, I know, a rock star," Meredith interrupted curtly.

"A fine surgeon," Bailey corrected. "Like you."

"Apparently not," Meredith noted, pointing to the charts. "Nothing I do satisfies that woman. The charts are never on time, my sutures are always a millimeter off, or I'm always too-" she continued, ranting impatiently.

"That's how you learn," Bailey pointed out. "She's one of the best."

"So she says," Meredith sniped.

"You don't get to her position just by being arrogant," Bailey corrected sternly. "That woman's one of the top two or three female Neurosurgeons in the country. Do you know what that takes?" Bailey asked.

Meredith nodded, glancing away. She'd known that since she was five, too.

"She sees that in you," Bailey added quietly, clearly impressed. "She wouldn't be riding you like this if she didn't. She wouldn't be wasting her time."

"No," Meredith agreed sharply. "Can't waste time."

"Excuse me?" Bailey asked, sizing her up again.

"Nothing," Meredith muttered impatiently.

"See," Bailey objected, shaking her head abruptly, "see, that's your problem. You got distracted, and you forgot why you're here."

"Oh, and why's that?" Meredith snapped, slamming the chart she was writing on shut.

"Because you have talent," Bailey said, dressing her down with her eyes, "just like your mother. And you can be a great surgeon, just like your mother, and you should use it-"

"For my mother?" Meredith demanded sharply.

"For your patients," Bailey snapped, glaring at her, "and for yourself, and because you have something that very, very few people have. And you don't want to-"

"Screw it up?" Meredith snapped.

"Waste it," Bailey corrected sternly, glaring back at her again as she collected her own charts and walked away.

Gathering her work, Meredith ducked into the Resident's lounge, spreading several open files in front of her. They might as well have been her high school grades, or her college transcripts, or her med school applications; she could almost hear Ellis' voice from her cubby, reminding her that she'd have to do better.

* * *

"Why are we here again?" Alex asked a few weeks later, scowling as Meredith grabbed their tickets and pushed them through the entry gate.

"It's sunny," she insisted, scanning the flier the attendant had given her. "How often does that happen in Seattle in March?"

"Since when do you care about the weather?" he grumbled, hurrying behind her as she selected a pathway. He was used to being roped into food shopping on the days he had off, or an occasional trip to the mall or dry cleaner. But she'd plainly lost her mind.

"I used to beg my mother to take me to the zoo when it was nice on Saturdays," she replied, surveying the signs directing them to the primate and snake and exotic reptile exhibits. "Which happened, like, twice a year," she added sarcastically.

"I thought we were going to the grocery store," he noted, following her as she wandered wide eyed past the monkey exhibit. "We need beer," he reminded her, "and cookies."

"Here," she said, stopping at a nearby stand and handing the concession worker six dollars, in exchange for two large bags. "Have some pop corn," she added, shoving one of the sacks into his hands while approaching the African Parrot enclosure.

"This is bird food," he grumbled, stuffing a handful into his mouth as she leaned toward the fencing and cooed to the colorful parrots, tossing some popcorn in their direction.

"Look at them," she insisted, as they fanned out their wide wings and plucked kernels eagerly from the air.

"Pathetic," Alex growled as he chewed. "They're caged in. They should be out hunting, like Hawks," he added smugly.

"Hawks?" Meredith scowled, turning back to him suddenly.

"Iowa Hawkeyes," he said, nodding proudly.

"Wrestling birds?" she snorted, recalling the faded lettering on one of his tee shirts.

"Hawks are fierce," he insisted, gnawing his pop corn. "They stalk their prey, wear them down, circle them, then they pounce. Survival of the fittest" he added dramatically.

"I used to draw tigers and lions all the time," she said, ignoring his commentary as she moved on to the big cat exhibit, where a speckled cheetah wandered through the huge out door enclosure. "She always said it was a waste of time."

"Probably was," he shrugged.

"I wanted to see them for real," she insisted. "Didn't you go to the zoo when you were a kid?"

"In Iowa?" he snorted.

"What," she insisted, "they don't have zoos in Iowa?"

"Just corn," he said smugly, holding up his half devoured bag.

"No animals?" she smirked.

"Cows," he shrugged, returning to his munching, "chickens, horses. No tigers."

"I thought you were raised by wolves," she taunted.

"Yeah, wolves too," he added, still poking into his bag. "Farmers shoot them, though."

"Survival of the fittest, huh? As if that's a fair fight," she retorted, pulling out her map and muttering something about insects.

"Bio 206," he retorted, finishing off his pop corn. "They never said it was fair. Like the merger," he added bluntly.

"Huh?" she asked, pushing open the heavy door of the darkened snake house, and peering curiously inside.

"They're after our territory," he pointed out.

"The snakes?" Meredith asked, scowling.

"The new Residents," Alex grumbled, picturing the mangy bunch of orthopedic residents that Palmer had brought with him from Mercy West. "They're trying to claw their way up the surgical food chain, like we are," he insisted.

"We are?" she asked suspiciously.

"Yeah," he insisted, looking at her as if it were entirely obvious. "They're hard core, we have to be hard core."

"Survival of the fittest?" she repeated dubiously, struggling not to laugh at him.

"Eye of the hawk," he nodded seriously, raising his eye brows at her.

"You think we should wrestle them?" she snickered.

"Go ahead, laugh," he nodded, peering admiringly at a huge python slithering toward a rat. "That was us when we were interns," he noted, pointing to the rodent. "Now we're-"

"Primates, at least, I hope?" she taunted. "Or, no, avians."

"Birds eat snakes," he pointed out.

"Some snakes eat birds, too," she noted, wrinkling her nose at him. "How do you know when you get to the top?"

"You stop holding retractors all day," he grumbled, imagining Palmer being swallowed whole by the enormous python, "and actually get to do something interesting."

Meredith shook her head, sure this conversation sounded familiar. "You could just-"

"Palmer's going to cave," he insisted fiercely.

"Oh," Meredith jumped suddenly, turning away and squeezing her eyes shut. "Like that rat?" she asked hesitantly.

"Yeah," Alex nodded approvingly, watching eagerly as the snake devoured its meal.

"Ugh," she muttered, grabbing his sleeve and dragging him outside.

"That was pretty cool," he noted, still looking back toward the snake house and half stumbling as Meredith pushed him along the path.

"Butterflies," she insisted, shaking her head. "I want to see the butterfly exhibit."

"Might be their feeding time, too" Alex taunted.

"Sick," Meredith muttered, shaking her head. "And you'll still want to go the grocery store after we're done here."

"We need cookies," he shrugged, following her into the exhibit.


	3. Chapter 3

He hadn't exaggerated about the corn. It stretched endlessly in every direction, waving in the light spring breeze like a state wide welcoming committee. She imagined that Izzie would have loved it here, acre after acre of golden waves flowing across the countryside, interrupted only by an occasional grain silo or farmhouse or burst of wild flowers.

Watching the scenery speed by, she stood by her conclusion, reached hours earlier, that he wasn't really from Iowa. Izzie could have been, but him, no. She fiddled with her cup, tea long gone, her stomach still churning as she nervously scanned the expansive fields.

She'd played every card she could imagine with the Chief to be here, the fake daddy card, the dead Ellis card, the he's a poor widower whose mother just died card. She could have thrown in the merger for good measure, but Webber relented, since her bag was already waiting in the car anyway, and they both knew she had no choice, anymore than he did.

It was their thing, they rode silently to funerals together; they could probably make it a hobby, she thought with a demented smirk, several hours into the trip. It would be a better funeral than Susan's at least, she imagined, and at least his mother hadn't died of the hiccups; it would actually be a funeral, for one thing, and not the pathetic washing away of her own mother, who, really, no one would miss, not even her daughter.

Eying Alex stealthily, she realized she had no idea what to expect when they got there, or even where there was exactly, though she was fairly sure that they wouldn't be toting his mother back to Seattle in a zip lock baggie. But change is good, she reminded herself, the grim mantra she repeated whenever she pulled out her plain black dress and the rest of the funeral kit she'd taken to keeping together in her closet, for retrieval at a moment's notice, because change happened a lot, and it was best to stay ready.

She dozed off a hundred or so miles later, hours before they arrived at the small motel around eleven that night. She didn't ask why they stayed there, instead of at his mother's house, or why he was still awake hours later, watching Nickelodeon, after a full day of driving, or what they were doing the next day.

Waking much later then she intended the following morning, she noticed that he was already gone, to the morgue or the funeral home she imagined. Showering quickly, she pulled her dress out of her bag, shaking it free of wrinkles as she spied the small clock by her bed. His aunts had arranged the service for four that afternoon, she remembered; that left her enough time for lunch at the diner across the street.

When she returned he was already back and almost dressed, fumbling with his tie as he mumbled something about the cemetery being only ten minutes away. The knot of his tie was lumpy and lopsided, she noticed as they left, like it had been at Izzie's funeral; his shoes were still dusty, too, like they'd been at George's.

His mother had three sisters, all of whom sternly sized her up; he'd told no one here anything about Izzie, she realized suddenly, maybe not even his mother. They called him Alexander, with slight disapproving tones, and they wore sensible shoes and proper hats and toted well thumbed Bibles ringed with rosary beads. Her mother would have hated them, Meredith concluded; then again, Ellis hated everybody.

She listened to the ceremony, hoping she wouldn't giggle at any stray "ashes to ashes" references. Glancing sideways, she noticed Alex staring impassively at the sun soaked field around them as if he was afraid to move, or to breathe, or to do anything but stare impassively. Izzie would know what to do, she imagined. Izzie loved mothers, and probably aunts, and they probably all loved her. Izzie would know what to do, when he stared impassively amid another hail of prayers.

The funeral was over before she realized it, the thumping of car doors dragging her back to an emptying cemetery, as she followed him to where they'd parked. She went back to the diner later that evening, bringing him back an apple and a pear, and sugary cereal. It sat ignored as she drifted off to sleep, but it was gone when she woke around three a.m., as reruns of Gilligan's Island flickered in the darkened room. She still wondered why he watched that so often, since it had no curvy blondes.

But change was good, she reminded herself with a grim smirk, slipping over into his bed and sliding her arms around him as her lips brushed his neck. He was trembling slightly, like he had the night he damn near froze to death in her mother's house, and his eyes were glazed, like they'd been the night of Izzie's funeral, and his hands were shaking and ice cold, like they'd been the night of his solo surgery. She'd seen it all before.

Pushing him down onto the bed, she kissed him again, her hands working their way around his back. It was absurd, really, but this was who they were; it was what they did best, besides funerals; it was all that was ever left, when the black dresses and the dusty shoes were put away. Pulling her light green sweater hastily over her head, she almost giggled at the thought of three proper Iowa women with sensible shoes and appropriate hats and well thumbed Bibles, sure they'd disapprove of her as much as they did of him.

She felt his icy fingers singeing her flesh as his strong hands closed around her, and her fingernails dug into his shoulders; she knew he wouldn't care if she drew blood; they were surgeons, after all; it wouldn't matter, either, how their clothes littered the floor, since they'd seen it all before, too often to mistake it for anything but what it was.

Every night at the motel was the same, since she had nothing else to give him, certainly not advice, since mothers weren't her thing, and she went the next morning, and the morning after that, and the morning after that, back to the sun drenched field where he stared impassively over the rolling hills, tracing his finger lightly over the gravestone.

She called the Chief daily, assuring him that they'd be back as soon as Alex was finished. Finished what was a good question, since he seemed to be searching for something in the grass that blew cheerfully around the grave where he sat, occasionally squinting into the sun. Like most good questions, though, she'd doubted it would ever have a good answer.

"We need to go back," she said finally on the third night, her voice scarcely a whisper as her breath returned and the wild beating of his heart steadied somewhat.

To her surprise, he nodded abruptly, bobbing his head wordlessly as he settled against her chest. He was already snoring minutes later, before that night's episodic tale of the seven castaways had been told even, and she wondered as the familiar theme song faded off in the background, if Gilligan and the others even wanted to be found, really.

They made one final trip to the cemetery the next morning, early enough for him to wipe stray dew drops from the grave's polished marker, which shimmered in the vibrant dawn.

"She never left Iowa," he observed, his quiet voice startling her, since he'd said nothing about her until that point. "But she wanted to see an ocean someday."

Meredith nodded, pointlessly, she realized, since he was still looking out over the slight hill that sloped toward the small town. She could imagine her own mother laughing at an aspiration so mundane, a wish so paltry, and that died so quietly, and in such an utterly ordinary place. It would have galled Ellis Grey, Meredith imagined, to settle for a life so small, as if something as simple as an ocean could seem so unfathomably far from here.

"I thought he'd come," Alex continued flatly, tracing his finger over the lettering on the grave marker again, halting at the "v" in Karev.

She blinked uncomfortably, her throat running dry as a light breeze swept through the rows of grave markers, promising another beautiful spring day.

"Is he even alive?" she asked awkwardly, the only question she could think of just then that might even have an answer. She watched him pull his hand back abruptly, almost flinching, and she realized that that question was as open as any other.

"I was going to bring Izzie to meet her," he continued, "before…"

Meredith nodded again, watching as he swept a few blades of grass from the stone.

"I wouldn't have left her," he blurted out suddenly, "no matter what," he insisted, shaking his head. "Who does that," he added, bewildered, "who would just leave someone behind like that, and never come back, not even…"

His voice died in the soft breeze, and she watched as he traced his hand over the stone again.

"I wouldn't have been like him," he muttered fiercely. "She wouldn't have been afraid of me. I would never have…" he continued, his voice quavering as it sank to a whisper, "I would never have left her."

There were no words for any of it, she knew, certainly not here, where the past was neatly filed away amid precise rows of chiseled stone, as if burying the dead was ever the end of the matter. Searching her own hands, she shivered in the slight breeze.

"We need to go back," she said again, so quietly she wondered if he could possibly hear her. It was the only option, really, and she'd drive this time, occasionally glancing to her right as he stared out the window, at placid rows of corn. She knew he was still looking for him, and for Izzie, and for his mother; nearly a hundred miles of silence later, after he'd finally drifted off, she knew he was still looking.

Corn gave way to mountains, and as the Seattle skyline loomed in the distance, she took a familiar detour. It was out of their way, and she was grateful that he was still out cold as she drove slowly past her old house, gazing at the porch swing, and wondering if Izzie's laughter still rang through the upstairs hallway, and if Derek's scent still clung to her old bedroom, and if her mother's anger still rattled the windows when it rained.

It was absurd, really, to think she could leave it all behind, just by moving across town. Even Dr. Wyatt would have to admit that. It was crazy, she thought hours later, as Alex curled around her again, to think that change was even possible, when ghosts followed them everywhere, and even new buildings were haunted, and they never learned from past mistakes.

* * *

He'd woken that first morning after the funeral to steady, even breathing beside him, to the feel of warm skin under his fingers, to the close rhythm of a heartbeat amid the gentle rise and fall of her chest, and pulled back abruptly, blinking into the dimly lit motel room, faintly tinged by the dawn. Bile burned his throat as his head spun wildly, and he could scarcely make out the shadowy figure as she made her way to the bathroom, shutting the door quickly behind her.

Dropping back onto the bed, he ran his hands over his face as he heard the water running, heard her washing away any trace of what was obviously yet another mistake. He stared groggily at their clothes littering the floor, their travel bags propped in the corner, beside a rickety old oak table, the television still flickering, grateful, at least, that he'd never brought Izzie here. That would have been an even bigger mistake, he thought, pulling on his clothes and grabbing his keys as he left, locking the door behind him.

She followed an hour or two later, sitting under a tree near his mother's grave, where he sat tracing his fingers over the fresh cut stone. He had no idea how she'd gotten there, or why she'd followed him, or how she knew where he was.

Squinting into the distance, he watched warily, waiting for him to come. He should at least do that for her, he thought bitterly. He waited for hours, returning the next day, and the day after, not caring that the bastard might not even be alive, that he might even be buried right beside him, somewhere, in an unmarked grave.

Poking idly at a few drops of water clinging to the letters of his mother's first name, he remembered that she wanted to see an ocean someday. Seattle had an ocean, sort of, but he never had the money, and she ran out of time.

He felt the sting of his eyes, burning in the noon sun, as the phrase echoed through his mind. He'd heard it for weeks after Izzie'd first said it, that she'd run out of time, too, time, and strength, and the will to fight for them, even though she'd promised.

_They would all still be here, if they hadn't run out of time._ He knew that that was a lie, too, though, that his mother would never have come to visit him, even to see Seattle's ocean, and that his father would never come back, even if he could, and that Izzie would have been long gone from him by now, even if she'd lived.

He heard Meredith insisting that they had to go back, as if the hospital wasn't doing just fine without them, as if anyone would even notice they were gone. He eyed her warily as she retreated again to her silent sitting, wondering why she wasn't yelling, or demanding, or didn't just take the damn car and go back herself, if it was so freaking important.

He'd already wondered that the second night, anyway, as more manic restlessness clawed through his veins, and she moaned under his weight, her teeth sinking into his shoulder. He wondered the same thing the following morning, when he again sat bolt upright, his head pounding as she wandered to the shower, after shooting a groggy and bewildered double take in his general direction.

He wondered some that day as well, as she sat in her spot under the tree, if she'd ever screwed anyone in a cemetery, and how many sins that would count as in that Bible they buried his mother with. He imagined Mere'd find that concern funny, since she'd already seen it all, though it might make a good story for her shrink.

His mother would never have liked Mere, he imagined, and she'd horrify his old aunts. They would have loved Izzie, who would have known just what to say, who would have collected recipes and decorating tips, and made them feel like they mattered, anytime she smiled at them. Just as well he never mentioned her, or brought her to visit; they would have told her he was just like his father, anyway, and given her all the more reason to run.

It was already getting late, again, he realized, and chilly when they returned to the motel, and downright cold when she crossed back from the diner with her dinner, along with a pear and an apple, and a dented tin filled with Fruit Loops acquired who knows how.

He ate them while watching Gilligan foil another escape plan, ignoring her occasional puzzled glances. He imagined the show was easier to love as a kid, when he'd wanted nothing more than to get away from here, from the fields and the corn, from his father's rage and his mother's desperation; it made less sense, somehow, after you'd run and run and run, only to find you'd gotten nowhere.

"We have to go back," he heard her whisper later that night, as her breath returned and the pounding in his chest receded, and he realized his arms still surrounded her. Almost stiffening reflexively, he noticed that she didn't recoil when he nodded, and she didn't freeze when he accidentally bumped her arm, and she was already more or less asleep by the time his panic stilled enough for him to untangle his fingers from her hair.

* * *

"Grey!" Muriel Swenson shouted, her voice echoing through the hall like buckshot, nearly upending a half dozen food carts, as startled Nurses' Aides ducked for cover.

Meredith watched her stalk down the hall, sure that she spied people slinking against the walls, just to clear a wide path, as she imagined what she hadn't done "quite right," this time, a phrase she was hearing in her sleep.

"I need to see you in my office tomorrow morning promptly at seven thirty. Make sure these are done properly by then," Swenson added, flawlessly enunciating "properly" as she dropped the latest stack of patient films on the Nurses' station without another word.

She was gone in a flash, leaving Meredith twitching and rattled amid a pile of file folders, as the nurses looked on warily, thankful it wasn't them this time. Hauling the stack to the Residents lounge, she rechecked her notes from her early morning surgery, and made several corrections, while trying to ignore Swenson's voice echoing through her head.

A few minutes later, she noticed a bloody thumb print on one of the files and hastily wiped it away, cursing the return of another persistent bad habit. She'd gnawed her nails down past her fingertips as a child, she remembered, when grades came out, confirming for her mother what a "bright but under-performing" student she was.

Glancing at the clock, she noticed that it was already after six p.m. Swenson would be in at exactly five the next morning; not five fifteen, not five o four, not even four fifty nine, promptly at five. It was how she did everything.

_Cristina would love her_, she thought, smiling at the idea of her friend now juggling her residency in San Francisco with the baby she'd had two months before. Pulling her phone from her pocket, she scanned the most recent picture again, of the wide eyed, alert little girl already wearing Stanford Medical baby scrubs.

Ellis would have loved Swenson, too, Meredith thought, shoving the phone back into her pocket as she returned to her charting. Nearly three hours later, she crossed the street, grateful that her condo was so close. Her mother would approve of that, at least, that she all but lived at the hospital while doing Swenson's bidding.

Undressing quietly, she crawled into Alex's bed, glancing at the clock by the window, and remembering that she'd need to be back in a few hours. Swenson expected serious Residents to be there whenever she was; it was her only shot, Meredith knew, at landing a Fellowship in her department. Bailey had told her as much, again, just that past week.

That reminder could have come from her mother, too, and she wondered as she settled into her pillow when exactly everyone around her had started channeling the Great Ellis Grey, Rock Star Extraordinaire. She was still wondering that when she finally started to doze off, and felt his arms curl slowly around her, pulling her closer.

She wondered if he was ever quite awake when he did that, since they were usually too tired for anything more than whatever he was doing with his hands, anyway, whether he realized it or not, since his breathing was still deep and regular, and she could feel the slow, steady beat of his heart, accompanied by a faint, muffled sigh.

Her mother had definitely approved of that, she thought bitterly, of sex with the wrong people, wedged in between important surgeries. She wondered, sometimes, if bad habits could be genetic, too, since she'd already been a dirty mistress.

She'd wondered that for months, as she watched Richard Webber haunt the hospital, struggling to keep the job to which he ultimately sacrificed his marriage, the prize even Ellis Grey couldn't win. She wondered what that said about him, and about her mother.

She wondered, but wondering was a waste of time, and she still had hours of paper work, and early morning rounds, and she was just too tired to care, really, whether he was awake when his hands wandered down her back, and his lips brushed her hair.

* * *

"It wasn't how you're supposed to have a baby, anyway," Alex whispered, stroking the preemie's arm as he absently scanned the monitors in the darkened NICU.

"Iz would have loved you, though," he continued, lightly brushing her fingers. "She'd have probably picked some crazy old fashioned name for you" he added. "But Evie's pretty cool," he agreed, noting that Evelyn had been written in on the infant's warmer.

"They won't pick on you for that," he assured her, shaking his head seriously.

Iz would be disappointed, he imagined, that she wouldn't get the little girl she'd dreamed of. But it wasn't like he was going to use them, and frozen embryos didn't last forever - _they have a shorter shelf life then canned tuna_, he thought with a twisted smirk - and it wasn't like they'd had time to decide what to do with them.

_She'd be mad_, he'd imagined earlier that day, when he'd finally signed the forms to donate them for research. _She'd never understand_, he was sure, that he couldn't just leave them to someone else, even if they were just popsicles, really, and even if it wasn't like they would ever have needed him, any more than she would have.

"You down here again?" Bailey muttered from behind him, as she briskly approached the infant warmer and picked up the baby's chart. "She need a knee replacement already?"

"I was checking her vitals," he grumbled, hastily fumbling for his stethoscope.

"Palmer know you're down here again?" Bailey smirked, as she fiddled with the lead wires and monitors and checked the latest lab reports.

"I'm not on…" Alex started, before his voice dropped off just as abruptly.

"That's right, you're not," she noted, eying him carefully, as he watched her work. "Yet you're still here. Ortho not everything you'd dreamed of?" she taunted.

"It's great" he scowled, motioning toward the pile of paperwork Palmer had given him earlier that day.

"Comes with the program, any program," she chided, looking him up and down, her tone playful but challenging. "There's still time, you know. Fellowship applications won't even be open for another few months. Still time for you to get in some extra work -"

"Did Palmer say something to you?' Aex demanded, his eyes narrowing as he turned to face her. "Because that jack ass-"

"Your Attending," Bailey echoed, raising her eyebrows. "You mean, that jack ass, your Attending? What about him?" she repeated, emphasizing Attending at each turn.

"Nothing," Alex grumbled. He'd had enough of her hovering routine, after Izzie died, as if he was some pathetic charity case.

"Karev," she interrupted. "Alex," she repeated in a more even tone. "I'm just saying that if you're having a problem with…with Palmer," she said, choosing her words carefully.

"I'm on top of it," he interrupted gruffly. He shouldn't be there, he knew. He should be sucking up to Palmer, or maneuvering to get back on Sloan's service. Or researching the latest innovations in orthopedic staples and screws, as if it wasn't all mind numbing, and the patients weren't all whiny and annoying, and Palmer wasn't a jackass.

"I thought the same thing," she added quietly.

"Huh?" Alex asked, looking up briefly.

"How would it look?" she smirked. "The Nazi in Peds."

"Baby sitting," he muttered under his breath, repeating Sloan's assessment.

"Bad enough I heard that after I had Tuck," she reminded him, loosening the lead wires. "I thought they'd never take me seriously again. I'd worked so hard to get where I was, and I was giving that up to make less money, working with patients who spit up on me," she finished, shaking her head incredulously as she lifted the infant from the warmer.

"Dr. Bailey," he interrupted, rolling his eyes. It was one case, and it had been all her idea, anyway, and he'd only stayed with the baby to make sure, and it was only two nights, and it wasn't like the NICU couldn't be spooky at night. And freaking cold, he thought wryly.

"The Chief thought I was crazy," she insisted, cutting him off. "Told me I was throwing my career away."

"Dr. Bailey," he interrupted again, scanning the room furtively, as if the giggling, gossipy nurses hadn't been bad enough, as if one poor preemie clinging to him when she had no one else made him the freaking stork.

"You're going to have to ask me, Karev," Bailey insisted, shaking her head as she held the baby, rocking her gently. "No one made it easy for me. Not after I turned down a Fellowship, and then went crawling back to Arizona Robbins for a second chance."

"Look," he stammered, fumbling to shove his stethoscope roughly back into his pocket. "I just came down here to-"

"You ready to ask me, yet?" she demanded smugly.

"Call me when she needs a knee replacement," he grumbled, as he turned away hastily, grabbing the stack of files Palmer had given him and retreating to the Residents lounge.

* * *

"Too much sugar," he grimaced, the following week, sticking his tongue out as he swallowed half of the misshapen Gingerbread man.

"How can you say that?" Meredith demanded, scanning the recipe one of her scrub nurses had given her, her stirring spoon frozen poised over a large orange bowl. "You eat Fruity Pebbles," she protested, "they're-"

"Edible?" Alex prompted, chugging his milk to kill the lingering taste.

"Only if you want to lapse into a diabetic coma," Meredith retorted, as she checked her measuring cups. "I put in the exact amount this says to use," she mused, gazing at the cookie sheet in front of her, as she nibbled the arm off one of her latest creations.

"Okay, maybe not," she conceded, swallowing awkwardly as Alex offered her his glass.

"Maybe it's not supposed to be exact?" he asked, scanning the paper on the counter with a puzzled frown.

"How much is a tablespoon, exactly?" Meredith grumbled.

"They sell those at bakeries, you know," Alex pointed out, rooting in the refrigerator, "already assembled."

"That's not the point," Meredith protested, measuring out another mix of ingredients. "I'm a surgeon, a freaking brain surgeon. I should be able to make a decent batch of Christmas cookies. How hard can this be?" she added.

"Too hard for a brain surgeon, apparently," he muttered, retrieving a pear.

"Typical," she grumbled, shaking her head, "no holiday spirit. I suppose you volunteered to work Christmas Eve again?"

"Palmer needs someone to cover his service. I'm…" Alex hesitated. "I need to show him I'm serious. And not a future dishwasher," he added sourly.

"I'm sure you're exaggerating," she protested. "Bailey thinks you're-"

"An ass," Alex interrupted wryly, tossing his pear rind into the trash.

"A good surgeon," Meredith corrected, shaking her head as she slid another tray of cookie dough into the oven. "She just thinks you're in the wrong area."

"Right," Alex grumbled. "I should be a freaking stork."

"Not that," Meredith laughed. "Peds."

"Baby sitting," Alex growled, rinsing off his hands. "Might as well just be a nurse, then."

"Now you sound like Cristina," she teased, laughing when she saw his grimace. "You could at least think about it," she pointed out.

"And go from Palmer back to Bailey?" he smirked.

"At least she's not Swenson," Meredith said, stirring the tea she was brewing. "Always looking over your shoulder, just waiting for you to screw up."

"Swenson loves you," Alex taunted.

"No," Meredith protested, "she loves my mother. She thinks I'm going to be her. That's what she loves."

"Least it gets you into the O.R.," he pointed out. "I'd still be in Plastics if Sloan wasn't such a jackass."

"I get into the O.R. because I'm good," Meredith insisted smugly. "And you thought Plastics was boring, too," she reminded him.

"Why are these so flat?" she demanded, pulling another batch of lopsided, under cooked cookies out of the oven with a sigh. "They never look like this at the cookie exchange."

"You can't bring those," Alex insisted, shaking his head with a frown.

"Of course I can't," Meredith protested, moving to the refrigerator to pull out more eggs. "Can you imagine what Swenson would say?"

"She bakes?" Alex asked, missing any connection entirely.

"No," Meredith insisted. "I'm positive she doesn't. But if she did," she continued, "the Gingerbread men would have perfect proportions, and they'd never burn, and they'd be the best cookies in the exchange, because if they're not the best they're worthless," she rambled, mixing another batch.

"I think the heat's getting to you," he noted, motioning to the oven with a studied frown.

"What," she grumbled, "isn't that what we're supposed to be? The best? That's what my mother always said."

"Least she always had a kick ass job," he pointed out. "She was a rock star. Everybody respected her. Who wouldn't want that?"

"They were afraid of her," Meredith snorted.

"She still got what she wanted," he pointed out, "and she didn't have to depend on anyone else for it, either."

"Maybe," Meredith shrugged reluctantly. She wondered, sometimes, what Ellis wanted, really, before she became a dirty mistress, before she was left behind, before she slit her wrists, before everything she worked for dissolved into her tangled brain physiology.

"Well, I already told Lexi that I'm coming to their Christmas Eve party," Meredith said, shaking her head and wiping her hands on a dish towel brightly colored with singing Christmas trees. "If I'm not here when you get home," she threatened, "no snooping."

"Snooping?" Alex scoffed.

"Yes," she insisted seriously. "I already put your present under the tree, in case you hadn't noticed," she added sarcastically.

"Like I'd-" he protested.

"You're basically five," she noted.

"Maybe," he nodded smugly. "But I was smart enough to hide yours."

* * *

"Are you sure you got enough?" Meredith asked sarcastically, months later, watching as he shoved four cartons of Orange Juice into the refrigerator.

"They were on sale," he retorted, poking his head down as he pulled a gallon milk jug from another plastic grocery sack, "and I had a coupon."

"Of course," Meredith taunted, rolling her eyes. "You're like those coupon ladies in my magazine," she noted, holding up the glossy publication as she stirred her tea at the counter. "Do you trade with the nurses at lunch?"

"Those cardboard squares were on sale too," Alex added, ignoring her commentary as he motioned toward another bag, "so I got two boxes."

"They're called crackers," she corrected, pulling them from the bag and surveying the box label for ingredients. "They have fiber, protein, complex carbs," she added, as she motioned toward his Marshmallow Coco Puffs, "you know, actual food."

She knew she was pushing him, but she'd been waiting for an "I told you so," for a smug lecture, for something, for three days; it was bugging her.

"And why did you buy cookies?" she asked suddenly, surveying the counter. "You know I'm going to bake later this week."

"That'd be why," Alex noted, grimacing at the thought.

"My cookies are-" she retorted.

"A public health menace," Alex filled in, pouring a glass of milk as he grabbed one of the packages he'd bought.

"And how many of these did you get?" Meredith asked with a frown, picking up one of several identical boxes of dry instant soup mix. "There are forty eight servings here," she noted incredulously.

"They were on sale, too," he mumbled, shrugging casually. "You need to add water," he added seriously, as if that weren't perfectly obvious.

"No kidding," she giggled, "you think I'd just eat the powder right out of the box?"

"That couldn't be worse then your cookies," he added dryly.

"At least I eat actual food," she retorted, opening one of the boxes and moving to boil some water.

"Yet who got sick?" he smirked, walking off to the living room with his milk and cookies in tow.

Meredith rolled her eyes, relieved that it was finally beginning, that she'd no doubt hear over the next few days how he'd reminded her several times to get her flu shot, and told her to wear her scarf, even if she was just going across the street, and pointed out that it was raining and that they had several umbrellas in the hall closet.

She'd waited days for the inevitable commentary, as he came home from the hospital, bypassing Joe's to watch old sitcoms. It drove her crazy, really, that he listened to her breathe, as if her mild flu would explode into raging pneumonia at any second, and not run its course in a week or so. She almost mentioned it the following evening, when he crawled into bed beside her, though he was asleep before she found any words.

She almost mentioned it the following week, and again the next month, as his hands wandered down her back. She'd learned to ignore them months before, for the most part, his hands, when he thought she was asleep, and he pulled her closer as he wrapped the red plaid comforter she'd given him more tightly around them.

She'd considered letting him know, once or twice, that she was aware of his game, but never before his fingers found just the right spot or two, and she could feel his warm skin closing around hers, and she was already drifting into the steady rhythm of his breathing, and he was asleep himself again before she could remember exactly what her protest was.

It was all just physiology anyway, she reminded herself weeks later, as she traced careful patterns across his skin, naming the muscles and tendons as she went, as she had with the cadavers in med school. Reviewing the nerve pathways as he sighed sleepily, she traced the synchronized release of hormones and neurotransmitters, of natural sedatives and analgesics, wondering why people even bothered trying to distinguish sex from drugs.

She remembered that from high school, the stern lectures that got the dreamers all whipped up over waiting for their true loves, and set the booze and screw crowd into fits of laughter, and sent the cutters – two cliques over in the hierarchy, but with a similar need to feel it under the skin to feel anything at all - back to their razors with a shrug.

She wondered, sometimes, why the dreamers never got the punch line: that it all gave way to chemistry and physics sooner or later. Dr. Wyatt was one of those, she thought with a smirk; the woman would never get that it was all about neurons firing, and the release of hormones and neurotransmitters, and that was really all there was too it, as if she didn't know that full well, since she was a doctor, too. Well, technically.

Trailing her fingers lightly along Alex's side, she listened as he sighed softly again, curling predictably into her touch. He'd have been a cutter, she imagined, if he hadn't gotten off in the wrestling ring, where they spilled blood and broke bones fighting over cheap tin statues that collected dust on windowsills.

That would be something to ask Wyatt about, she thought with a giggle, if she'd ever mentioned Alex to her. But that would just mean more questions, about more things that the woman would never get anyway. Tugging him closer, she almost giggled again as she wondered, while a familiar echo of pleasure rippled through her, if he was cheaper then Tequila, or therapy, all things considered, and if he'd considered that a bonus.

Watching an errant moon beam straggle into the room, she wondered if her mother had ever been a dreamer, like Wyatt, before she became a cutter, before promises were broken, and true love returned to his wife, and blood coated their kitchen floor, and professional ambition became another drug. She wondered if she might even have been a dreamer herself, if it might have been genetic, even, if she hadn't already seen it all.

She wondered, but it was all too clinical, how her hands traced his parasympathetic nervous system, and it all felt too familiar, the scars beneath the soft fascia, and it was nothing a normal person could stand, to be dissected like a cadaver, or skinned like a dead fish. It was vaguely like trespassing, she thought, though he was already snoring softly into her chest, which would technically count as trespassing, too, she imagined, if they both hadn't already seen it all before, too often for any of it to matter.


	4. Chapter 4

_Every monitor beeped angrily as Alex charged into the room, every indicator already pointing in the wrong direction. She was running out of time, and the ocean waves were pounding against her bed; she was drowning, and he'd driven the bastard away too late; furious tides smashed her headstone, and he watched helplessly as they ripped the ring from her pale finger, and the bastard's sneering face swam into hazy focus. _

Jolting awake, Alex pulled hastily away from the body beside him, sure that the jack hammering of his heart would rouse her. He'd missed his intern year, lately, where at least he'd been too tired for these crazy ass dreams.

"You awake?" she mumbled sleepily, scarcely opening her eyes.

He ignored the question, willing his breathing to steady and the blood to stop pounding in his ears, and his body to still, until he heard a light sigh, and her soft snoring resumed as she curled back around him. Almost flinching, he forced himself to stay put, sure that she wouldn't ask anyway, and that she slept far too soundly these days, with Muriel Swenson wearing her out, to remember anything when she'd been scarcely awake to begin with.

She'd know it meant nothing, anyway, he reminded himself, awkwardly settling back into his place. She'd know dreams were just the random firings of neurotransmitters, the simmering of brain chemistry. She was a neurosurgeon; she'd know as well as he did that dreams were meaningless, like the one he'd had almost a week before, where he'd been trapped in the NICU, clad only in a floor length white beard and a red hat, while Yang…

"She wants to see me tomorrow morning," Meredith announced at lunch the next day, frowning as she placed a mixed vanilla and chocolate pudding cup absently beside his tray. "What the hell did I do now?" she demanded, as she sniffed at her plate.

"Huh?" Alex asked, staring back blankly as he shoved the bizarre images away.

"Swenson," Meredith continued, sighing in frustration as she rearranged the contents of her sandwich. "I bet it has something to do with the research for the clinical trial. You know if anything's wrong, I'm the one who'll hear about it," she grumbled.

"So," Alex retorted, shrugging, "you still get your name on a major research project. What's your problem?" He knew he was running out of time, and that Palmer still thought he was a loser, and it was pissing him off that she was complaining about the opportunity of a life time, while he held retractors and filled in diagrams for a guy who already had him pegged as a future dish washer.

"My problem," Meredith snapped, glaring at him, "is that nothing I do is ever enough for that woman."

"You're still a Grey," he retorted, shaking his head at her.

"I worked damn hard to get where I am," she snapped, "and you know it. If she doesn't see that, then that's her problem."

"Then what," he smirked, leaning back in his chair as he crossed his arms over his chest.

"Maybe I should just become a baby catcher," she teased. "I heard you were working with Bailey again this week."

"Just a consult," he grumbled, angrily shoving his straw in his drink. It was his only other option, really, to get Bailey to take him back on her service. Palmer had finally told him as much weeks ago, that'd he'd need to find another Fellowship program.

"That's not what the nurses said," she taunted, digging into her salad.

"You trust them?" he snorted, rolling his eyes as he stabbed at his fruit cup. He wondered how many people in the hospital already knew he was Bailey's latest charity case.

"They said you volunteered to-" she continued, ignoring his annoyance.

"Bailey made me," he insisted fiercely. "Besides, I did it to get out of another knee replacement, big deal." That was all he needed, for people to think he'd gone all pink and squishy, especially after Izzie.

They'd finally almost stopped - thanks to the merger, and the influx of new personnel, and his move to a hard core specialty – those looks that screamed pathetic widower. He was sure they'd already begun again that previous evening, though, as the preemie he'd helped deliver burrowed into his chest.

"I hear you were adorable. They were all going on about how you stayed with her over night and -" Meredith teased.

"Look," he interrupted sternly, pointing his sandwich at her. "That kid was thirty eight weeks. She had…she just needed…" Alex stammered.

"She had a misplaced Ortho Resident wrapped around her little finger, from what I hear," Meredith crooned, giggling as she watched his face redden.

Dropping his napkin back onto his plate, he clumsily gathered his things, desperate to be anywhere but there, anything but a wash out in a specialty he didn't even like, anything but the loser Palmer said he'd be, anything but a charity case, again.

"Is it really so bad," she asked, suddenly serious, "that you like working with kids?"

"I don't…" he stammered, glaring at her. "I just wanted… I… I have diagrams to fill in," he grumbled, pushing his chair back and standing abruptly.

"Alex, wait" she called, standing quickly to catch him before he stormed off.

"What?" he demanded, slamming the tray back on the table and crossing his hands over his chest again.

"You forgot this," she said quietly, pressing the mixed pudding cup into his hand as she collected her own things and walked away.

* * *

Almost a month later, Meredith arrived promptly at seven thirty a.m. at Swenson's office, as she'd been summoned, yet again, and stood at the door, shifting from foot to foot as if preparing to bolt at any second. Whatever she'd done this time, she imagined she'd spend the rest of her natural life span trying to correct it, to get it "quite right."

"Come in," Swenson said briskly, suddenly opening her door and motioning to the chair in front of her pristine desk, surrounded as always by scans and folders and charts, with neither a photo nor a coffee cup in sight.

That still surprised Meredith, sometimes, since she knew Swenson main lined caffeine. But wondering about it was a waste of time, she reminded herself, as she sank into the seat that Swenson offered as unobtrusively as possible.

"I've been reviewing your work," Swenson noted firmly, leveling a stare at her. "You really think you're cut out for Neurosurgery?" she asked bluntly, emphasizing "neuro."

Meredith dropped her gaze to her hands, picking at her nails as her heart pounded in her ears. She'd been almost dreading this day – almost - she'd just never seen it coming this fast. "I-" she started, pulling at her fingers as she locked her focus on the gleaming desk.

"Good," Swenson interrupted. "I do, too."

"What?" Meredith asked blankly, too taken aback to consider appropriate forms of address.

"I forwarded your dossier to Jacob Jaeger. You've heard of him, no doubt," she noted.

"Of course," Meredith nodded. Hhe does all the leading clinical trials on neuroblastoma, he's-"

"He's the best," Swenson filled in smugly, "and he only wants my best Residents for his Fellowship program."

"Fellowship program?" Meredith repeated blankly.

"At Arizona State," Swenson noted proudly. "This is quite a coup for you," she added, handing Meredith a large, bulky white envelope. "The terms of your contract offer are on the first three pages. He pays well, of course, for a junior fellowship position, and the research opportunities will be extra-ordinary, probably the most exciting in the country."

"He was thrilled to read your file," Swenson added, standing abruptly to usher Meredith out of the office. "And when he found out you were Ellis Grey's daughter, well, that just confirmed everything I'd written in your recommendation letter."

"You wrote me a letter?" Meredith asked suddenly, turning the large envelop over in her hands, almost as if she expected it to bite.

"Of course," Swenson said, looking at her strangely. "I told Jacob you're going to be a great Neurosurgeon. One of the best of your generation," she added, motioning to the letter head. "I hope you won't make me regret those words," she added sternly. "I'm not known to exaggerate."

"No," Meredith stammered, wide-eyed. "I mean, yes. I mean, I won't-"

"This is a fabulous opportunity. Congratulations," Swenson noted briskly, abruptly ushering Meredith out of her office and closing the door behind her as she rushed off to her next consult, leaving Meredith staring after her.

Two hours later, she was still toting the envelope around as she went to lunch, absently setting her tray down about five minutes before Alex dropped in beside her, grumbling about over-cooked peas. She watched blankly as he salted his food without even tasting it first, as usual, and surreptitiously scanned her tray for the extra pudding she usually got him, his eyes lighting up when he noticed it was mixed vanilla and chocolate.

"I got a Fellowship offer," she said quietly, her voice still quavering as she tried to get used to the idea.

"From Swenson?" he asked, poking his straw into his drink.

"Arizona State," she said flatly, as if she still didn't quite believe it herself.

"Arizona State?" he repeated with a scowl, as if he hadn't quite heard her right. "You applied to Arizona State?"

"No," Meredith protested, shaking her head. "Swenson sent my dossier to one of her colleagues. He's doing clinical trials in neuroblastoma," she added. "He's doing, like, the most important research in the field. He publishes in every journal. He's-"

"A rockstar, I get it," Alex snapped, stabbing at his peas as the blood rushed to his face.

"Cristina was happy for me," Meredith noted tartly, narrowing her eyes. "You worried even Bailey won't take you or something?" she taunted.

"What," he snorted, "because my name isn't Grey?"

"I'm a great surgeon," she retorted, waving the envelope at him. "I didn't even apply for this. He came to me," she insisted.

"Right, right," he nodded. "You're a rock star, too."

"I am," she added, standing abruptly and grabbing her tray, ignoring the glances of curious on lookers. "You can be jealous all you want," she added vehemently, "it won't get you an opportunity like this."

Shoving her tray back into the return slot, she stalked out of the cafeteria, not slowing down until she reached the tunnels, away from the noise and the hubbub. Slipping onto a stray gurney tucked in a hidden corner, she pulled the offer letter out again, staring at the impressive letterhead. It was even better than Harvard, she thought, sure that her mother would be thrilled, and wondering if the Chief knew already, since his recommendation had probably been solicited as well.

Leaning back against the wall, she studied the return envelop, emblazoned with a desert mountain scene. It was hot in Arizona, she imagined, and sunny all the time; it would be a fresh start, away from Webber, and the ghost of Ellis Grey, away from Izzie's laugh in the tunnel hallways, and Derek's smile in the elevators, and the marshmallow cereal she was always picking out of the couch, and Alex's wandering hands.

It was crazy, really, that she was shivering even though it was unusually warm in the tunnels, and nauseous, though she didn't have the flu, and bleary eyed though she should be thrilled; it was absurd, really, how the bile burned her throat, and tears stung her eyes, when she should be shouting from the rooftops that Jacob Jaeger wanted her.

Her watch beeped quietly, and she realized that she was due in surgery in a little over an hour, and that she had pre-ops to over see and paper work to check on and a reputation to build. She'd impressed Muriel Swenson; she was going to be extra-ordinary, maybe even more so than Ellis Grey herself. Swenson had told her as much. Pushing herself off the gurney, she hurried to the Residents lounge and slipped the envelope into her locker, her hands still shaking as she returned to her work.

* * *

Alex slammed his tray down the return slot behind hers, sending an errant fork clattering across the floor. Ignoring a few startled glances, he fled the crowded room, his head still pounding as his stomach churned. Diving into the nearest elevator, he got off at the first empty stop, near the darkened tunnels by the service bays. Slumping against the wall, he watched the shadows crawling across the dimly lit floor down the corridor, cast by people walking along the path besides the main building.

He listened for the familiar sound of water dripping, before remembering that he was not in the crawl spaces under his parents' house in Iowa, where he'd gone sometimes when he was five or six, and the screaming got too loud. It hadn't worked very well, since the old wood floors were cracked in some spots. He could still hear it all, from the basement, from the attic; no matter where he went, it was never far enough.

Struggling to control his breathing, he straightened where he stood, trying to focus on the shadowy motions. They'd been like rats in a maze when they'd started hanging out down here, he thought with a smirk, though back when they were interns, they weren't even high enough on the surgical food chain to qualify as mammals. Lichen maybe, came a stray idea ricocheting through his mind, a throwback to Bio 206, his sophomore year.

He leaned heavily back against the wall again, sliding onto the floor as he ran his hands over his head. More stray thoughts flooded his mind, like kernels of corn popping: he'd be living in his car again soon; she just got a kick ass fellowship; he'd be the last of his cohort left here, if Bailey finally took him back on her service; she couldn't wait to leave, now that she had somewhere to go; he'd never get an offer like that; she'd never have stayed anyway; he should have seen this coming, it always did.

Pacing down the hall, Alex ducked into the nearest elevator, returning to the Residents lounge. Changing and grabbing his coat, he dug the folder Palmer had given him months ago from his locker, and was half way out the door before he realized he had no idea where he was going.

He settled for Joe's, hunkering down in the back room as he paged through now mostly out-dated fellowship listings in Orthopedics, most of which had wanted better grades, or better test scores, or more publications, or more clinical trial experience, or more hours specifically on their favored specialties then he could possibly offer. Ortho was hardcore, a familiar voice sneered from the back of his mind; he'd never have made it anyway.

Watching the growing pile of listings that would never even have considered him, he imagined Palmer snickering, if he'd had the nerve to apply to Cleveland, or Mayo, or even Florida. Surveying the comically slim pile of prospects, he tossed the papers into the trash and returned to the hospital, conducting an over night Web search. But he'd already gotten the hint long ago; he'd be lucky to be Bailey's charity case.

Returning home the following evening, he knew she was long gone, off to Arizona, off to her interview, which was really just a formality, off to her brilliant career. He stared idly at the television, sure that it was sunny and warm in Arizona, and that their facilities were first rate, and that she'd be surrounded by some of the best Neurosurgeons in the field, and that she was already signing a contract, and maybe setting up a lab of her own.

He missed the last episode of the Munsters marathon the next evening, and was mostly asleep on the couch, tangled in his sleeping bag, when the door clicked quietly and she stepped into the hallway, shaking the rain off her coat. He watched warily as she crept through the darkened room, lowering the sound and returning an errant beer bottle to the coffee table as she passed him on her way to her room, while he mostly held his breath.

At least another episode and a half went by before he moved a muscle, burrowing under his sleeping bag as he struggled to quell the queasiness in his stomach. He could scarcely hear over the pounding in his ears, which masked any rustling until he felt the first chill, and her arms slipped around him before he could move, tugging him to the floor.

"I left the t.v. on," she muttered, her fingers lightly unfastening the buttons of his faded flannel shirt, as he froze in his place. "It was the one where Herman buys the jalopy."

He heard a vague sigh as her warm hands traced his back, the feeling a dizzying contrast to the growing chill as she unwrapped him, like one of the dead fish in the Public Market that she dragged him to on Saturdays. He wanted to ask her, but he already knew, and all the other questions just died in his throat.

"We could get a television for the bedroom, you know," she whispered.

She'd said that before, when she came home late to find he'd left it on, as he always did when she wasn't there. But she never turned the set in the living room off, and she never demanded that he set the timer, or turn it off himself.

"Not that that's good feng shui," she added, shaking her head.

"Huh?" he asked vaguely, almost wincing as she drew him closer, and her hands closed more insistently around him.

"It's about energy, spirits, that kind of thing," she noted casually, recalling an article she'd read on the plane, as her clothes joined his in a tangle on the floor beside them. "I told you my mother's house was haunted."

He almost protested, but he knew he was running out of time again. He almost resisted, but his limbs were already heavy, and the first familiar wave of endorphins and serotonin already coursed through him, and he doubted he could move even to save himself, even if the room suddenly caught fire, or was flooded by a tidal wave.

It was all physiology, a rush of neurotransmitters whose names he struggled to recall as her fingers played skillfully across his skin. He tried to focus on naming the individual muscles instead, until her fingertips sank into a familiar spot, melting his resolve, and he couldn't remember, just then, when he'd gotten into this habit of not pulling away.

* * *

She stirred early the following morning, well before the winter sunrise, as was Swenson's habit, checking the time reflexively. Shifting uncomfortably on the hard floor, she pulled the bulky sleeping bag more closely around them, and watched the shadows from the television dance across the far wall. They were almost ghostly, but she just let them be.

Feeling hesitantly for her robe, strewn carelessly amid his clothes, she almost flinched as he curled closer, amid a familiar chorus of soft murmurs. It still seemed like trespassing sometimes, or eavesdropping, the way he melded into her, even when he was under his sleeping bag, or his beloved flannel sheets, where he still had only his skin left to hide behind.

He'd been better concealed that first night she unwrapped him, on the floor of her mother's haunted house, she thought, where at least the chill and the ghosts and the dim moon light cast thicker shadows around them, and the vague chattering voices upstairs had drown out the rhythm of his heartbeat, and she hadn't yet uncovered every scar.

She knew them all now, though; her skilled surgeon's fingers delicately tracing their raw edges as he slept, even as she picked at them mercilessly after day break. It was absurd, she knew, that she spent her days pushing him away, and her nights pulling him closer. It was the kind of thing Wyatt would have asked her about, if she'd mentioned him at all.

Sighing quietly, she remembered her other bad habits, and that she'd need to unload the two pears from her travel bag, which she'd picked up in the airport without thinking, since she'd never liked them anyway. She wondered what her mother would think, about her whirlwind tour of Jaeger's lab, and her already being pursued to work with one of the stars in her field, and the pears that lingered in her luggage, like Wyatt's business card.

She would have rejected his orange juice on principle, Meredith imagined, because Ellis Grey never had time to get sick; she would have refused the boxed chicken soup, too, as if an old wives' tale could cure a jilted mistress; she would have dismissed as mundane, the familiar rhythm of Thursday night pizza, and half price Wednesday night movies, and errands on Saturday, and been horrified by imperfect flannel sheets bought on sale.

Ellis would have hated the condo, she knew, and hated that Meredith had sold, in two days, the home that had been in her family for four generations; she would have hated that her grandmother's furnishings were elsewhere, now, and that time was ticking down on the offer of a life time, while she lay hundreds of mile away from her future.

She wondered why she hadn't seen that the future was due to hunt her down by name, and why she took such a perverse thrill in being pursued by a dream she wasn't sure was even hers, and how she could think straight, much less sleep, with time running down.

She wondered if maybe he wasn't spying, too, in this game they'd played since that first night in Iowa, since he no longer froze when she tugged him closer, and no longer recoiled when he woke tangled in her arms, and no longer pulled back into his shell like a startled turtle, when her lips brushed his hair before he drifted off to sleep.

She wondered, sometimes, if he was hiding like the castaways on that island, behind the layers of flannel he burrowed under, and the faint flickering of the television, and the nagging and snarking that she was sure was meant to drive her away; she'd seen that all before, after all, she'd done it all herself, as she picked relentlessly at his scabs.

She wondered if this was part of the game, too, and why she was shivering like he had the first night she'd unwrapped him, and how some stupid little dusty statues on a windowsill could be so freaking important, anyway, and why she could never quite stay awake when he was curled around her, and she could feel his heart beating, and hear an occasional murmur, even if it was trespassing, possibly, or at least eavesdropping, technically.

* * *

He was gone the next morning when she woke, and the morning after, and hadn't been home in between, and it was probably just as well that he hadn't seen the brochures she'd spread out on the table, of apartment complexes with pools and tennis courts and grand mountain views, as she fingered the return envelop with the desert scene, and spoke again with Jaeger, whose enthusiasm for his research left her slightly giddy.

She sat at the kitchen table early that evening, flipping idly through the glossy ads touting apartment amenities, and remembering how little she cared if the cabinets were birch or maple, or the counters marble or granite, or how many burners the gourmet stove had.

She was sure that her mother would have been in Arizona already, not wasting a minute, and that there would have been no decision for her at all, not even on which apartment to select, as if being as close as she could to the hospital wasn't the obvious choice.

She fingered one of the glossy brochures lightly, drawn to the peaceful mountain vistas, the promise of grand views from every room, when she heard the door open, and Alex's keys land on the hall table, as he walked into the room scowling.

"Why is it so dark in here?" he asked, setting a pizza box down on the table as he went to turn on the lights.

She piled her brochures to the side as he handed her a plate and a beer, while she looked at him with a quizzical glance.

"It's Thursday," he shrugged.

Gathering her papers, she followed him into the living room, sitting beside him as he grabbed the remote, searching for the latest mindless sitcom marathon. She watched her pizza cool in silence, as his sat untouched in front of him, while droplets of water ran down his beer bottle, like a drunken time piece.

She watched him nervously moving his fingers, his ears reddening until he retrieved a flyer from his jacket pocket. He hadn't taken it off when he got in, and he seemed to be shivering slightly, though the fire was lit, and the heat was on. He placed the wrinkled paper on the coffee table, glancing at her as he swallowed repeatedly.

"I found this program last week," he said quietly, motioning to the flier as he avoided her eyes. "It's new, they're not even advertising until next year," he shrugged, watching her closely as she studied the paper, her eyes narrowing. "Bailey recommended me for it," he added, shrugging again.

Eying the familiar letterhead, she felt her heart pounding as her throat tightened. "You're applying?" she asked quietly "for a Peds fellowship?"

"Already did," he said, staring awkwardly at the pizza plate in front of him. "Did the phone interview three days ago; heard back this afternoon. It's mine if I want it."

"Do you?" she asked hesitantly, watching as his ears reddened even more and he shifted uncomfortably in his seat.

"I just…I just thought maybe…" he struggled, suddenly, almost reaching for the crinkled paper, "maybe we could, you know, get a place, like now, like this…" he stammered as he motioned around the room, looking at anything but her.

"A place, like together?" she asked softly.

"Yeah," he nodded, exhaling heavily. "I can pay now," he added, pointing to the letter. "With both of us making decent money, we could get something nicer together then if we, you know…"

"What?" she giggled. "You want a palace?"

"No, no," he stammered, snatching the paper off the table and shoving it roughly back into his coat pocket. "I just…" he added, staring at his plate again. "It's no big deal," he mumbled. "It's just, it'd be-"

"Like now," she filled in. "Something like this," she added, pulling out the brochure she'd admired nearly an hour before.

"You found a place already?" he asked quietly, eying it suspiciously.

"I found this one pretty quick," she reminded him, motioning around the room.

"Yeah," he nodded, hesitantly glancing at the glossy pictures.

"It has amazing views," she noted, pointing to one of the panoramic photos.

"Yeah," he said, staring blankly at his now cold pizza as he listened to her descriptions.

"I'm selling the couch, though," she added casually.

"The couch?" he looked up, suddenly alarmed. "Why?"

"We have to find one that won't fill up with marshmallow cereal in the crevices," she insisted, watching as he rolled his eyes at her.

"Least I thought to pick up light bulbs," he reminded her, as he reached for his beer.

"Well then you can organize the move this time," she teased.

"You mean since I know about this one?" he pointed out.

"Okay, okay," she grumbled, pulling the brochure back from him. "Really, you like this one?" she asked. "There are all these others," she noted, pointing to her pile.

"No, no," he shook his head quickly, "that one's good. They're probably all pretty similar anyway, right?" he mumbled.

"I hadn't made up my mind," she said softly, after an awkward silence, "before you came home. Not just about the apartment, about the whole thing."

Alex glanced at her sideways, a new wave of worries obviously flooding his face.

"I know. It's the opportunity of a lifetime," she repeated sarcastically. "My dead mother would have disowned me again, from the grave."

"It's a great Fellowship," he noted. "You'll be able to do anything when you finish. Palmer basically told me I'll be lucky not to end up washing dishes," he grumbled.

"He did not," Meredith protested. "And he must have had some influence in getting you into that program. It couldn't have been just Bailey."

"I guess," Alex admitted reluctantly. "But it's not like-"

"Will you be sorry if you take it?" she asked suddenly.

"No," he said, shaking his head. "It's, there are other things involved," he said quietly. "It's…"

"I know," she agreed. "Before you came home, I was almost ready to, well, like you said," she added quietly, "there are other things involved."

"You would have stayed here?" he asked, so quietly she almost missed it.

"You want to come to Arizona with me?" she whispered.

He nodded nervously, still staring at his pizza as she slipped the brochure under his fingers.


	5. Chapter 5

Pulling her artificial Christmas tree out months later, she surveyed it thoughtfully, fluffing out its pre-decorated branches. _It looks like Charlie Brown's tree,_ she thought with a frown, shaking her head as she set it on the hall table. Barely two feet tall, its braches splayed out at odd angles, probably from being jostled in the move that past summer, and the star on top had lost most of its glitter.

"What do you think?" Meredith asked, stepping back to take another look.

"Looks dead," Alex scowled.

"It's artificial," Meredith pointed out, motioning to the box. "It looks fine," she huffed, fluffing out two of the branches again and cringing as more glitter fell from the star. "Oh, shut up," she protested, wandering away before he could say anything, though she could hear his silent smirk from around the corner.

He rolled his eyes, following her as she moved through the living room, past the large windows with the expansive mountain views. It was near dusk already, and their shadows trailed over the beige furnishings, disappearing into the flickering fire.

"We could get another one, you know," he said, as Meredith retrieved a small broom and a dust pan from the closet and began sweeping glitter from the hall floor.

"What?" she asked, straightening up as he leaned against the wall in the hall way.

"These things," he said, pointing to the now semi-lopsided tree.

"They're called Christmas trees," she reminded him. "You actually want to get a Christmas tree this year?"

"Or a cactus," he shrugged, averting his eyes with a shrug. "I mean, I don't care, but if you like having one. We could put it over there," he added, pointing to the arched double window in the living room. "That'd be far enough away from the fire place. We're both off tomorrow. We could go-"

"Cut one down?" she teased.

"Whatever," he sighed, turning as he pulled away from the wall.

"I want one with lights," she blurted.

"Huh?" he said, turning around.

"Multi-colored lights," she added.

"In case we run out of light bulbs?" he taunted, raising his eyebrows at her.

"Shut up," she said, grabbing her broom and pushing him back into the kitchen. "I bet you'll even find a coupon for one."

"I'm just being practical," he grumbled. She could talk all she wanted, but he was the one with school loans to pay, and a beat up old jeep that always needed work.

"Oh," Meredith giggled, "so that's why we have two smoke detectors in every room?"

"No," he retorted, following her back into the kitchen. "That's because you still try to be Martha Stewart whenever a cookie exchange comes around."

"Leave my cookies out of this," she chastised, handing him a beer as they went back into the living room.

"Sure," he agreed, tossing her the remote. "They're innocent bystanders anyway."

"This year," she insisted, shaking her head as she searched for the channel she wanted, "they're going to be great. Once you taste them, you'll be begging for more."

"I'll be too busy replacing the batteries in the smoke detectors," he countered, groaning when he saw her turn to a cooking channel.

"Why do you torture yourself with this?" he grumbled.

"This isn't torture," she said flatly. "They're doing six episodes on Christmas cakes and cookies tonight."

"Why can't they just make regular cookies?" he frowned. "Maybe they're easier."

"You like Christmas well enough when it comes to presents," she reminded him. "You still watch your Munsters DVDs often enough."

"That's different," he insisted, shaking his head as he drank his beer.

"Right," she snorted. "Admit it, you just have a thing for Marilyn Munster."

"Lily," he corrected, wriggling his eyebrows. "She was demented."

"Figures," Meredith agreed.

"So, what time do you want to go tomorrow?" he asked.

"For the tree?" she giggled.

"Or, whatever," he shrugged.

"Whenever you finally wake up," she teased. "We can put up some on the ornaments your patients made for you," she added.

"What?" he asked, stopping mid sip.

"The construction paper ornaments," she said. "One of the nurses told me that-"

"Which nurse?" he demanded.

"Alex," she giggled. "It's funny, it's nice-"

"I…which nurse?" he sputtered.

"Why?" Meredith asked suspiciously.

"I want to make sure I bring her some of your cookies," he grumbled, glaring at the television as Meredith swatted him.

"None of my patients has ever done that for me," she noted. "And I'm sure none of my mother's did, either. I certainly wouldn't have," she added under her breath.

"I thought she didn't do holidays?" he smirked.

"She didn't," Meredith agreed. "We didn't. She always said they were just a distraction, anyway," she added.

"Fine," he grumbled. "You can have the stupid ornaments if you want them so bad."

"Thank you," she laughed, rolling her eyes. "That's just what I always wanted."

"Is something burning?" he asked suddenly, turning toward the kitchen.

"My cookies," Meredith shrieked, bolting up and rushing out of the room, with Alex following close on her heels.

"You can't bring those," Alex insisted, as he re-set the smoke detectors, while Meredith watched her latest creations smolder on the counter.

"Why can't I get the hang of this?" she demanded incredulously, glaring at her pile of recipes as if they were responsible.

"Guess it's too hard for a brain surgeon," he taunted.

"You're right," she nodded, hands on her hips. "I should leave this to you, since you play with kids all day."

"They might have better luck," he agreed, surveying the kitchen as she scrapped her rapidly crusting cookies into the trash bin.

"Baby sitter," she called after him, as he retrieved a pear and retreated to the living room.

* * *

"It's half vanilla, half chocolate," Meredith called from the closet, as she was rooting for a hanger.

"You didn't need to-" Alex started tiredly, reluctantly re-focusing his eyes.

"I know," she said quietly, hanging up her blouse and pulling her old sweater around her. "I'm going to go check the mail, see if my magazines came."

Alex nodded vaguely, forcing down the heinous tasting orange liquid with a huge gulp of Ginger Ale, before turning eagerly to his milk shake. It was one of the few things that didn't make his throat hurt worse, and at least it would stop his stomach from growling.

Leaning back against his pillow as he drank, he returned his attention to the current episode, remembering that Herman had gotten a football scholarship in this one. Just as well, he imagined, since he was too tall to be a wrestler. _No leverage_, he observed, as he finished his shake and burrowed back under his blanket.

It had been Mere's idea, the television in the bedroom. It wasn't necessary, he'd insisted, but he watched it daily, and it had been a life saver over the past few days. The flu, he could accept; pneumonia, he could accept. But mumps were another story, he thought, recalling the teasing from the nurses and the amusement of his fellow Peds surgeons.

"Occupational hazard," they chortled, as one wrote prescriptions and another offered him a lollipop.

_They'd pay for that_, he insisted, sinking further into his pillow with a weak groan as he remembered that Mere still hadn't weighed in. He knew it was coming, especially after he'd reminded her for weeks that she still needed a scarf, even in Arizona.

He was almost asleep twenty minutes later, when she returned with her tea and one of her trashy magazines, climbing into their bed as she observed what episode was on. Despite her best efforts to ignore them, she knew them all at this point, and could readily identify each plot after a brief glance. She'd never admit that to anyone, though, even to Cristina, _especially not to Cristina_, she thought with a shudder.

"You talk to Jaeger," he said sleepily, "about the interview?"

"Offer," she corrected softly, flipping through her magazine. "And what's to talk about? I was offered an interview, at Colorado University. I turned it down."

"I thought it was what you wanted," he said.

"I like it better here," she insisted, shaking her head. "I love working with Jaeger. I hate paper work. I don't want constant pressure to publish-"

"You'd practically be an Attending," he pointed out. "You'd almost have your own department to run. You'd be set for life."

"I don't want it to be my whole life," she said quietly. "I don't want to be my mother."

"Who says you have to be like her?" he asked, scowling.

"Jaeger," she noted bluntly. "If I took that job, I'd have to be just like Swenson," she added with a grimace. "Does that make any sense?"

Alex shrugged, frowning. "Peds is off the rock star track," he reminded her wryly.

"It is not," Meredith insisted, shaking her head. "And Andrews thinks you're a great surgeon, you know."

"She drinks," he grumbled, as the words struggled out through a suppressed cough.

"She's the Head of Peds," Meredith noted, giggling. "And she raves about how great you are with your patients."

"They gave me mumps," he retorted, rolling over and burrowing back into his pillow.

"They're kids," she pointed out.

"Walking germ factories," he muttered. "I should have stayed in Plastics."

"You love it," she corrected.

"We should get a bigger place, though," she added casually, "when our lease is up."

"We wouldn't need a bigger place if you'd stop buying dish towels," he mumbled.

"You just hate change," she reminded him, quickly handing him more Ginger Ale after he'd finished coughing, "and scary movies."

"I don't hate scary movies," he protested, burying his face in his pillow.

"Right," she snorted, as she returned to her magazine. Sitting back against her pillow, she flipped through the glossy pages, checking briefly to ensure that he'd taken his meds before drifting off. Shaking her head nearly an hour later, she almost questioned her sanity, again, as she restarted the DVDs, though he was mostly asleep.

It was why she got the television anyway, she reminded herself, as she set her magazine aside and slid her arms around him, resting against his warm back. His fever was down, she noticed earlier, and he'd finished the whole milk shake, and she had managed to avoid giggling over his swollen features, and at least he wasn't contagious any more.

Checking the clock on his nightstand, she wondered if this would qualify as a waste of time, or a distraction, or simply absurd: a neurosurgeon leaving the hospital early on a gloomy late fall afternoon, to watch old sitcoms with a grown pediatric surgeon with a simple bout of mumps, as if that made any more sense then stock piling orange juice or boxed soup, or laying awake half the night listening to someone with a minor flu breathe.

They were trained to imagine worse case scenarios, sure. But it wasn't as if he needed her, she reminded herself, as she pulled the bulky comforter more closely around them, since he already had his meds and his Munsters, and Ginger Ale was just sugar water, and milk shakes weren't exactly health foods, and it wasn't like he slept any better when he rolled over, curling around her with a sleepy sigh as her hands slid gently down his back.

Watching dusk settle into the room, she leaned back into her pillow, wondering how she could ever explain to her mother, or even to Dr. Wyatt, that she'd scheduled no exciting surgeries for the next day, and that her to do list consisted largely of acquiring another vanilla and chocolate milk shake, and seeing how Herman Munster's football scholarship worked out, again, while a grumpy, prickly Peds surgeon snored quietly into her chest.

* * *

He would always hate Christmas. This occurred to him after he'd filled his gas tank, and absently tossed the garish holiday dish towels – with the dancing penguins in Santa Claus hats – on the store counter along with his soda, and the batteries for the smoke detectors, and the donuts he bought because she was still trying to bake, with the usual results.

Placing the towels on the kitchen counter that evening, he debated hiding them, sure that she'd think he'd lost his mind, and that he'd never hear the end of it. She'd be working late, though, which gave him time to do a Web search, and make some calls, after he'd dug the fake Christmas tree out of storage, like she'd asked him to the day before.

He should have stayed in Ortho, he grumbled, as he hung up on Bailey's 'I told you so' chortling, or in Plastics, where none of the patients made you ridiculous construction paper Reindeer or Santas, or gone Cardio, just to piss off Yang. He should have been out pricing Jaguars like Jaeger's, and weekends in the Bahamas, since he'd finally paid off his mother's expenses, and caught up on his med school loans.

He should know what to do, he insisted, as he stared at the forms in front of him; he should be excited; he should have kept the pictures Mere "secretly" took, from when he had the mumps and looked like an angry ass chipmunk; he should remember that he hadn't fought his way through medical school for this; he should hide the cookie cutters, he thought wryly, before Mere got home and launched another assault on the kitchen.

He was still fumbling with his papers at the kitchen island when she walked into the apartment, shrugging off her coat as she spied the mess in the living room.

He'd gotten the tree together, sort of, she noticed, almost wincing. But it wasn't standing quite right, and the decorations were still in the box, with the paper ornaments she'd saved from last year just to bug him, and he hadn't retrieved the box with the stockings and her cookie cutters, which she'd need for her baking marathon that weekend.

"Hey," she said, walking into the kitchen, "you got the tree out."

"Yeah," he muttered, hastily gathering his papers as he watched her put the tea kettle on and root through the cabinets for a mug.

"Did you-" she started.

"Do you want to get married?" he blurted, staring at the floor as she froze beside the sink.

"Married?" she repeated, the words barely escaping her throat. "I wanted you to get the purple storage box out," she stammered incredulously.

"Why would you think that?" she demanded more sharply, after her breath returned.

Alex swallowed nervously, popping up from his seat. He didn't know, really, and it was suddenly starting to seem like an even worse idea then it had that morning.

"I'll go get it," he agreed, hastily grabbing his keys and his jacket and retreating to their storage slot in the basement of the building. Leaning his head against the steel door, he tried to steady his freezing hands, struggling to open the lock as his stomach churned.

Back upstairs, Meredith stared blankly at the counter, her hands shaking and her head spinning as she glanced at the papers he'd been reading. She wondered briefly if he'd come back at all, and a demented smirk crossed her face as she imagined him fleeing across Arizona with a purple box full of Christmas stockings and cookie cutters.

He'd lost his mind, she decided, staring at the envelopes on the counter until her tea kettle blared, demanding her attention. She wasn't the marriage type, any more than he was, she muttered, taking her tea and her magazines into the living room, and sitting heavily on the couch, her fingers automatically clearing the stray marshmallows from the crevices.

Staring blankly at the fireplace, she popped up suddenly to light it, just to have something to do with her hands, as she wondered if he even realized how absurd it was. Normal people proposed on Christmas Eve, in front of a roaring fire; normal people bought rings, and had some freaking clue what they were doing. Normal people didn't propose on random November evenings, amid piles of papers they'd never even discussed, and dancing penguin dish towels, and a jumbled heap of red and green tin cookie cutters.

She heard the door open slowly, and watched as he hefted the bulky box near the tree, straightening awkwardly and moving toward the hall.

"Is this because of the offer?" she called after him, stopping him abruptly as he hovered in the shadowy doorway, his jacket still dangling from his hand.

"What?" he asked, bewildered and plainly distracted.

"I saw the offer letter from Andrews on the table," she said.

"It's two more years here, minimum" he noted quietly, after a lengthy silence, "if I stay in her program."

It was more than two years, she knew. It was more like four. It was advanced training and possible double board certification in critical care neonatal and pediatric surgery, two crazy competitive specialties. It was what she'd seen coming, when she'd over heard Pam Andrews raving - about how good he was with his patients, and all the great things she expected from him - at a hospital staff party, a few months after they'd first arrived.

"Do you want to?" Meredith asked, fingering her tea mug as he stood frozen in place.

She watched his eyes dart toward the television from across the room. It wasn't even on, but she knew what he was looking for. The silence was gnawing at him; she knew that, too, and just let it burn, lingering between them as her tea cooled. She waited a very long while, until he finally nodded, still looking anywhere but in her direction.

"I thought," he said haltingly, "… if you got another offer in the meantime…"

"You figured I'd just leave?" she asked bluntly.

It had never occurred to her that she would, really, when she heard it out loud, and she wondered, suddenly, if she expected the same from him. They were getting a bigger place in the spring; they were going to Jaeger's Christmas party next week; they bought milk shakes and boxed soup and dancing penguin dish towels. They…

"I won't," she said, swallowing uncomfortably. "I'll wait… until you're finished. All I want is more space for my dish towels," she added wryly.

"You really go over board on those," he noted, his voice still shaking somewhat as he shuffled his feet, as if weighing whether to jump out of the window right then and there.

"Yeah," she agreed absently, exhaling heavily as she returned to her magazines and her tea, and he went off to hang up his jacket and return to his paperwork. Staring blankly at the seat cushions, she noted a few more stray marshmallows, wondering frantically if she could return the couch and the television and the new dancing penguin dish towels, if she could recycle the construction paper ornaments and buy back her mother's old house.

It was absurd, she thought wildly, that he hovered with dry soup and wood crackers, bewildered and blinking from across the room; that he changed the heads on her electric toothbrush, and checked the expiration dates on her vitamins, and put air in her spare tire; that his hands wandered over her body, and his fingers tangled her hair at night, though he plainly wanted someone more stacked, more curvy, more blonde, more… something.

It was absurd, really, because she was sure he'd never forgiven her for throwing his trophies away, and she was sure he craved a Chicago high rise condo, and a BMW, and a life straight out of the Norman Rockwell annals. She was sure that she would own a big old haunted house again some day, filled to the rafters with antique furniture and dated medical journals and empty Tequila bottles lining the windowsills.

She saw it all vividly, except that he hated big cities, and loved his old jeep, and he brought home orange juice and boxed soup, even after she threw up on him in the lunch room, and she'd noticed that her own hands wandered after dark, too, whenever he finally drifted off beside her, as he had since they'd returned from Iowa.

It was all his fault, she insisted, still rattled three days later; it was his fault that he'd damn near frozen to death in her mother's house, that he over paid for a stupid ring, and barely had thirty seven cents to his name; that he'd dragged her to the movies, and the market and the zoo; that he'd chosen to be a freaking rock star stork, and to stalk her all the way to Arizona, and to leave a trail of marshmallow cereal on her couch.

It was all his fault, she insisted, that he slept tangled in his sleeping bag on the couch for the following week, as their panic subsided, and that her cookies kept burning, and that she'd never find the right shoes to match her dress for Jaeger's party, and that she could barely breathe, much less sleep, as the shadows from the television in the darkened living room reached into their bedroom, and played at the edges of her mind like ghosts.

* * *

He almost believed her. She said she didn't want a ring or a wedding. She said that she didn't want to be married, either, or at least, not to him, which was just as well, too, he imagined, as he watched her talking with Jaeger across the lavishly decorated room.

Sizing up the impressive mantle, Alex listened vaguely to two of his colleagues chatter about nothing, while the tuxedoed caterers unobtrusively served heavily spiked egg nog and champagne and mixed drinks. The room was mostly neurosurgeons and cardio, with a stray orthoped thrown in, all rock stars. She'd be one, too, he knew, soon enough.

Missing the punch line of a long winded joked, he smirked politely, something he'd learned to do in small doses, for short periods, as he navigated the wilds of hospital politics: the grant applications, the clinical trial funding, the research opportunities, all of which he'd need to plot his own long course toward an Attending position, someday.

Rolling his eyes at the huge, ornate Christmas tree blinking in the corner of Jaeger's grand two story entrance hall, he pictured the construction paper ornaments Mere had put on their tree again this year, so far removed from the garlands that trailed up each side of the double staircase, toward the shimmering chandelier hanging from the vaulted ceiling.

Ellis Grey would have loved this house, he thought idly, which was basically a palace. He wondered if Mere liked it, since it was decked out in all the Christmas crap he'd seen in her magazines, and how much more room she wanted for her dish towels, and whether a place like this would even allow dancing penguins in Santa Claus hats past the front door.

He got the whole wanting to be a rock star thing; he'd always wanted that; he got wanting to be rich, rich enough to never have to depend on anyone. But this he'd never get: not the fancy suits, or the crummy little sandwiches with the tooth picks, or the tiny glasses of five hundred dollar an ounce booze, that didn't work any quicker than cheap beer.

He caught her eye later that evening, and turned away abruptly when he realized he'd been staring. She hated these parties, too, or at least, she used to, before she'd begun baking Christmas cookies, and decorating for the holidays; before she sold her mother's house, and started over on the fast track to Neuro Attending hundreds of miles away, before she'd begun to breathe again, after that loser, and the merger, after… everything.

She'd changed though, he noticed, as she talked with Jaeger and his wife. She never complained much about working with him, and she'd already started up another clinical trial, and she raved about the weather to Yang and Webber and Bailey when she called them, and she always dragged him to zoos and fairs and exhibits on Saturdays, and she still watched those cooking shows at night, as if her baking wasn't freaking hopeless.

Driving home later that evening, he listened as she told him about Jaeger's newest research project, and teased him about Andrew's latest words of praise, which almost made him blush despite his best efforts, and grumbled about the over decorated house and the over cooked food and the inability of anything to count as a decent party if it didn't have Tequila, and required her to wear shoes that felt two sizes too small.

He almost protested about the whole shoe thing, which he'd never get, but her arms were already around him as she sighed, and she was already tucked closely into his chest as he pulled their plaid comforter around them, and her warm fingers were already burrowing into his back as her lips brushed his neck, and he almost believed her all over again.

A normal chick would have been long gone already, would push him away instead of pressing closer into his chest, almost as if she wanted him to be there in the morning. He wondered what she wanted, though, since she didn't want to be her mother, and she didn't want to be Martha Stewart – at least, not year round, and she told him she'd wait for him to finish his Fellowship. He wondered what she was waiting for, exactly, since it was always about rings, at least with normal chicks, and normal chicks never waited if they had a choice, and she'd always have choices.

She promised, he reminded himself, as his arms tightened around her instinctively; but he'd heard that all before. Leaning back into his pillow, he tangled his fingers through her hair, a color he never could quite name, as her familiar curves settled into his body, and a familiar wave of pleasure washed over him, as her body molded to his.

He should have pulled away himself long ago, he imagined, before her breathing became so hypnotic, before he stopped noticing the familiar rhythm of Wednesday night movies, and Thursday night pizza, and Saturday errands, before he stopped brushing off her encouragement to become the world's least likely baby catcher, before he started buying dish towels with dancing penguins in Santa Claus hats, without even noticing.

She sighed quietly, a sleepy smile crossing her face as his fingers played automatically across her skin, and his lips reflexively brushed her eye brows; he should have pulled away long ago, he imagined, before her arms closed more tightly around him, before he sank into the soft movement of her chest and the rhythm of her heat beat, before he'd begun to believe that her promises might mean something.


	6. Chapter 6

The main bedroom in their new condo faced east. Meredith remembered the real estate lady emphasizing that, while chattering enthusiastically about the high ceilings, the fire places in the bed rooms, the slate tile in the shower, the polished granite countertops. Why facing east mattered escaped her at the time; why she should be especially excited about slate tile, she suspected she would never know.

But the room faced east, the realtor repeated with a flourish, as if it over looked an ocean, as opposed to say, the sand and cacti that stretched around them in every direction, or the tranquil mountains that loomed in the distance. Meredith had forgotten that conversation until the following month, until the day after they had moved in actually, when the intense desert sun barreled into the room, promptly at 6:18.

_But change is good_, she grumbled that first Saturday, pulling the faded flannel sheets up over her head with a groan. She should have seen this coming, she imagined, like the light bulb thing, or the whole Great Trophy Fiasco. To be fair, though, she'd lived in Seattle most of her life, where sun rises were largely theoretical.

Leaning back into her pillow, she added "get blinds" to her mental to do list. They needed trash bags and paper towels, too, and Alex would need Fruity Pebbles, and of course he'd want Oreos, and plums, his latest fruit kick. She needed to find a new dry cleaner, too, she thought, brushing her lips against his hair, a habit she'd gotten into long before.

She'd learned it from him really, from how he tangled her hair through his fingers when he thought she was asleep, and pulled her closer at the first hint of snoring, and traced delicate patterns across her skin as he crawled in beside her after late night calls, and how his lips brushed her eyebrows as he pulled his beloved flannel sheets around her.

She wondered when he'd finally noticed that she was awake, sometimes, and when it had stopped mattering to him; she imagined it was around the time that any of it had stopped mattering to her, either, sometime after she'd found that spot between his eight and ninth ribs, and noticed that he didn't seem to mind her lingering there, as he drifted off to sleep.

She wondered, sometimes, if she should've stopped right there. It wasn't like she needed him, she reminded herself. It wasn't like she couldn't do without the marshmallow cereal in the couch, or the movies or pizza toppings they'd never agree on, or his commentary on her holiday baking and her quest for matching dish towels, and it wasn't like she'd sleep any worse, either, minus the snoring lump of red plaid flannel curled around her.

Turning awkwardly toward her nightstand, she retrieved the small metal band and slipped it onto his finger, watching as Alex stirred, a huge yawn threatening to overtake him.

"I know what you're going to say," she insisted, as he squinted into the glare. "We've already discussed this. This isn't what we do," she continued breathlessly, listing the objections she knew he'd formulate the minute he realized what she was suggesting.

"I knew it," she said finally, as he struggled to clear his head. "I knew you were going to say-"

"I was going to say we really need some blinds for that freaking window," he grumbled, pulling the sheets back over his head.

"What?" she demanded.

"Blinds," he repeated, turning over and pressing his face back into his pillow.

"What about what I said?" she asked.

"Monday," he mumbled.

"Huh?" Meredith asked.

"City Hall's closed on Saturday," he noted sleepily. "We'll go Monday."

"Monday?" Meredith repeated blankly.

"Something wrong with Monday?" he demanded, scowling toward the huge windows as he burrowed further under the covers.

"No," she stammered. "I just… you still want to get married?"

"Thought you'd never ask," he smirked, wiggling his newly ringed finger sarcastically.

"Monday," Meredith repeated softly.

"Um-huh," he yawned, settling back into his pillow and closing his eyes. "And while were downtown we can pick up some freaking blinds."

"No I told you so's?" she demanded suspiciously.

"Later," he mumbled, rolling over, already half asleep again.

He should have known better anyway, she thought, as she slipped back under his beloved plaid comforter, because it was like Sex 101 that you always kept one eye on where your clothes were, and you didn't listen when they breathed, and your hands didn't wander and you got out before anyone saw you and you sure as hell didn't ask any questions, since you knew full well what they wanted and it sure as hell wasn't a ring.

That was really his problem, she grumbled to herself – he didn't know what he wanted – because she was never going to be stacked and curvy and her hair was getting darker and she was not changing her name – because, because, she just wouldn't - and she was sure his body would reject the ring anyway, before they got to the courthouse, and it wouldn't matter, anyway, since they'd never agree on what color blinds to get for the bedroom.

* * *

"Here," Alex muttered, handing Meredith two small paper sacks as he put the pizza box on the coffee table, shrugging off his jacket as he went to retrieve two beers.

"You remembered the anchovies," Meredith nodded approvingly, happily digging into the first box.

"Always do," he protested, scowling at the smell as she dumped them on a steaming slice of pie. "Just don't get any dead fish on my side," he growled, opening his beer bottle as he spied what she was watching.

"What's in here?" she asked, opening the second box and peeking inside quizzically.

"Your ring," he noted, in between bites. "Figured I'd pick it up while I was over there to get the pizza," he shrugged, grabbing the remote and switching over to the football game.

"I told you I didn't need a ring," she insisted, delicately running her finger along its gleaming surface. It was a simple gold wedding band, almost as simple as his, really, with no hint of a stone; she almost wondered how they'd tell them apart.

"You made me wear one," he objected, rolling his eyes as he stuck out his finger.

"Just that once," she laughed. "You can take it off, you know." They were surgeons, after all, and she wasn't the jewelry type any more then he was, and it wasn't like him to spend money like that on something so frivolous, especially since he was still paying off his med school loans.

"Do you want yours or not?" he grumbled.

"How did you even get it sized?" she asked, turning it over in her hand.

"I measured you," he said, scowling sarcastically. "How else?"

"You did?" she asked, baffled. "When? I think I'd remember that."

"You were, uh," he mumbled, looking back at the television, "you weren't exactly awake."

"You did it while I was asleep?" she demanded. "That's, that's… spying, or something."

"I thought you'd want to be surprised," he protested.

"We're already married," she pointed out. "Kind of ruins the surprise element."

"Only for three weeks," he noted gruffly. "If you don't want it-"

"No, no" she laughed again, grabbing his hand. "I do, I mean, I want it. I just, here, you put it on me," she said.

"Fine," he grumbled, taking it from her and slipping it on her finger. "Happy now?"

"That I'm stuck with you?" she smirked, digging into her pizza.

"It was your idea," he noted, gnawing on his pizza crust as he scanned the television screen for sports scores. "I just wanted some blinds for the freaking window."

It had been her idea, he reminded himself later that evening, as she burrowed into his chest, sleeping peacefully. He wondered why, really, since it wasn't like she needed him. She'd never need money. He could pay his own way, now, finally, since he'd caught up on his school loans, and finished paying off his mother's burial costs.

She didn't seem to care much about that, though, and it wasn't like she'd ever have to scramble for a job. She'd already had one offer, even if she turned down the interview. He got it, sort of, that she didn't want to be Ellis Grey. He wondered though, what was so bad about being a rock star, and not having to depend on Bailey's good word.

Not that that part wasn't behind him at least, finally. He knew he could get a great letter from Andrews; that he wouldn't be living in his old jeep, probably; that he could get a good job elsewhere if he needed to, after he finished his Fellowship, if she decided to move and to take him along, which she would, since she'd given him a ring and all.

She'd told him twice, now, that he didn't need to wear it, and he was sure she'd join in if she heard the scrub nurses teasing him at the hospital. But he'd felt her fingers brushing his at night, often enough to get that she wanted it to be there.

It made no sense, really, since it wasn't like she was into cooking or sewing or any of those things wives did – her weird obsession with holiday house wares aside – and it wasn't like the condo had a white picket fence, and she never said anything to him about baseball or barbecues or back yards. He knew that she wanted to not be Ellis Grey, but it wasn't like she needed him for that, either, any more than she did for anything else.

Not that he needed her, either, he reminded himself. It wasn't like he couldn't buy his own cereal, since she complained about it getting stuck in the couch, anyway, like she did about his reminders and notes, as if she'd ever remember to get her flu shot or check the expiration dates on her vitamins, and it wasn't like she couldn't do her own freaking errands on Saturdays, or have her pizza delivered, or just watch pay-per-view.

It wasn't like he hadn't been ready, he reminded himself, if she'd gone off to Colorado without him; it wasn't like he wouldn't have seen it coming, though he was sure that she meant it, when she said he was a great surgeon, and she was always dragging him to the park, or the aquarium, and he was sure her car was up to date on its maintenance.

It wasn't like he'd needed the television, either, he insisted, glancing at it as she curled closer to him. It had been her idea, he reminded himself, like the ring, since it wasn't like he needed a stupid little metal band or a piece of paper to prove any thing; he'd already survived without his trophies – though she still shouldn't have thrown them away – and it wasn't like he needed any of it.

But she did, he was sure, since he knew that her issues had issues, and that she'd had a shrink on standby ever since that loser took off to Chicago.

It wasn't like she wouldn't trade the stupid ring in a minute, anyway, he grumbled, as he climbed into the shower on a random Saturday morning – for a set of matching holiday dish towels, or a recipe for cookies she could bake without involving the fire department – since it wasn't like chicks ever gave up on that fancy magazine crap.

He felt the sharp sting of chilly air just then, as the glass shower door opened with a demonic giggle, and a familiar form pressed against his back. He should have seen this coming, he imagined, gasping as her hands closed expertly around him, and wondering, idly, if their home owner's insurance would cover any stray damage to the glass shower enclosure, and if the policy made any allowances for acts of physiology.

* * *

The blinds were still crooked, Meredith noted months later, stirring early on another chilly Saturday morning. They would have driven her mother crazy, and Swenson to a breakdown. She loved watching the winter morning sun stream through the uneven slats, though, dappling across the room as she checked the alarm clock beside her bed.

Six sixteen, she noted idly, a habit that proved hard to break. Sinking back into her pillow, she ran through her mental list of things to do for the day: she wanted to pick up a few holiday placemats, and a serving platter for her cookies, no matter what Alex said.

It was all perfectly mundane, like the familiar sighs that escaped him as she traced a well worn pattern across his warm back. It was a waste of her skilled surgeon's fingers, no doubt, since she already knew all the right spots, and just how he'd move in response to her soft strokes, and a waste of her exacting education, to lay in a simply furnished condo on an early Saturday morning watching the sunlight stream through lop sided blinds.

It was a waste of her trained observational skills, too, to know that he'd wake between seven and seven thirty, and grumble while tagging along on her errands, and snark about her holiday house wares fixation, and check for sale prices – as if they were starving students – until she handed him a hot pretzel with extra mustard, or something red or orange and slushy, with enough sugar to induce a diabetic coma.

He'd argue with her about movies, too, as if his bizarre love of old sitcoms made him a serious film critic, and resist trying any new restaurant – as if most of what he ate wasn't scary enough – and grimace at any change in their routine, as if pizza was only made on Thursdays, and the theaters were open only for half price Wednesday night showings.

It was all entirely mundane, and would have driven her mother to distraction, since she could never have dealt with that smirk, or the marshmallow cereal in the couch – or his nagging about flu shots and vitamins and tire pressure and smoke alarms. Brushing her fingers across his, she traced the familiar outline of his ring.

It was all his fault, she still insisted, since it was his hands that started everything with their nightly migrations, and he was the one who practically begged for the simple gold band around his finger.

She would never have bothered if it hadn't been for him, she reminded herself, since it wasn't like she needed silly jewelry, or an embossed piece of paper tucked away in her top dresser drawer. It wasn't like she needed promises – as if she didn't know better – or envisioned a white picket fence. It wasn't like he expected Martha Stewart or Ellis Grey either, she thought wryly, or even Marilyn Munster.

It wasn't like she needed any of it, she reminded herself, though she was sure he did, since he'd been left behind before, and she'd seen it all. He needed the paper and the ring, she was sure, but it was simply another mindless habit on her part, the way she traced her finger across his gold band, like how she twirled her hair when she did paper work, and moved her fingers to make a point, and chewed her nails when she was nervous.

It was all a waste of time anyway, she imagined, like it was to lay wrapped in slightly imperfect red plaid flannel sheets, with an even more imperfect man coiled around her, sleeping peacefully; it was equally a waste of time, she imagined, that she waited for him to wake beside her, as if it wouldn't quite do if she were downstairs, or in the room next door, or even perched in the window seat across from their bed, as if it could possibly matter to him at all, that she be there when he finally stirred.

"You got a list?" he mumbled sleepily, almost a half hour later, pulling her closer as his eyes fluttered open.

He'd asked her that every Saturday for as long as she could remember; she imagined still hearing it when she was eighty, and still picking that damned marshmallow cereal out of their adjoining hospital beds in some nearby retirement community.

She almost said no that morning, though, just to bug him, except that his wandering hands had already returned, and she remembered again why she'd personally thought the huge master bath with the heated floors and enormous glass enclosed multi head shower was much more impressive, and functional, then the east facing windows. It was all his fault, anyway, she insisted moments later as she climbed into the shower behind him, that she knew just how to make his knees buckle, as he groaned under her surgeon's hands.

"Wishing for a caterer?" he taunted later that day, rolling his eyes as she tossed two coins into the mall fountain.

"Nope," she retorted, wrinkling her nose at him, "perfect cookies. And no," she teased, "there are no coupons for the wishing well."

Wandering into her favorite linens store, she sorted through piles of holiday place mats, admiring the array of festive colors and patterns.

"You're not seriously going to try to cook for Jaeger," he objected, watching as she debated between a traditional red and green print and a more fanciful winter scene.

"Yes, I am," she corrected firmly, cutting him off with a glare. "And it's going to be my best meal ever."

"This is because of that magazine on the kitchen counter, isn't it?" he accused, vaguely recalling the women's magazines he'd seen her paging through the previous evening.

"This is because I like Jaeger, and his wife," she insisted, "and I'd like to celebrate the holiday properly."

"And that requires new place mats?" he muttered.

"And matching dish towels," she added enthusiastically, moving on to the nearby display.

"For what?" Alex asked, puzzled. "The dishes won't care."

"They're on sale," Meredith reported smugly, holding up some bold Christmas patterns. "How come my Gingerbread Men never look like this?" she mused, frowning as she sized up the cheerful grouping.

"They're usually in shock," he volunteered.

"We should look at sheets, too, while we're here," she added, ignoring his commentary as she pointed to the clearance section in the far corner.

"Our sheets are fine," Alex insisted, eying her warily.

"They're fraying a little," she replied without looking up, rehashing the argument they'd been having for at least the past two months.

"They're comfortable," he added, following her skeptically.

"We can get the same kind," Meredith insisted, "the same color, the same pattern. You won't even notice."

"I will too" he grumbled, following her to the register as she paid for her new place mats and dish towels, and walked out to the nearest slushy stand.

"Here," she smirked, shaking her head as she pressed her shopping bag and an orange concoction of icy liquid sludge into his hands.

"This is a bribe," he pointed out, eagerly poking his straw into the cup as she shoved him toward the nearest bench.

"Of course it is," she agreed, handing him a booklet she'd pulled from her coat pocket. "I'm going to go look at the clearance sheets, while you check the G-rated movie listings for Wednesday. What are your patients recommending these days, anyway?" she teased.

"They're recommending I take someone else to the movies," he said flatly, without looking up.

"Like anyone else would go with you," she snorted, walking back into the linens store, in search of another set of imperfect red plaid flannel sheets, with matching comforter. Not that she wouldn't keep the old set anyway – forever - she reminded herself as she walked briskly to the clearance section, rolling her eyes. .

It was absurd to keep them, really, even if they were the first Christmas present she'd given him. It wasn't like he'd bail on her over them – if he hadn't taken off after the Great Trophy Fiasco, it wasn't like he was going anywhere. But it wasn't like they took up much room, either, and they had been on sale, and you never could tell when you might need an extra set of imperfect red plaid flannel sheets, with matching comforter.

She found just what she was looking for buried under some leftover Halloween pillows, amid over-grown floral curtains and garish stripped towels, and slipcovers for chairs in the shape, apparently, of giraffes. Hefting the large package to the register, she handed the cashier several bills. "Keep the change," she giggled, happily accepting her large bag from the perplexed young woman. "It'll drive my husband crazy."

* * *

"It's not really a giant spider," Alex whispered, gently stroking the baby's back as she settled more closely into his chest with a huge yawn. "Well, it is," he corrected. "But they're not usually that big. That's just because the radioactive meteor-"

"Not again," Meredith groaned, toweling her hair dry from her shower as she entered the darkened bedroom, where yet another episodic tale of the seven castaways flickered from the television in the far corner.

"She wanted to see how it ends," Alex protested quietly, as Meredith reached over to pry the sleeping infant from his arms.

"It's almost midnight. You can rot my daughter's brain some more tomorrow," she insisted, shaking her head as she returned the child to the bassinet beside their bed.

"It's science," he muttered, pulling the comforter up more tightly as she crawled in beside him.

"Not a good idea," she noted, as he slid his hands around her, slipping her bulky robe off as his fingers brushed her skin. She was stacked these days, in a maternal kind of way, and all curves, in all the wrong places, and her hair – despite the glowing articles in her magazines, extolling the wonders of pregnancy – had darkened even more over the past year.

"This was your fault, remember?" she objected, jabbing a finger into his ribs. "Keep your swimmers to yourself."

"My swimmers had help," he taunted, his fingers tangling her hair. "Or did you miss that day in medical school, doctor?"

"You're the one with the wandering hands," she protested, as he pulled her closer. "I just wanted a dog."

"You're just jealous because she likes me better," he said smugly.

"She'll develop better taste as she gets older," Meredith insisted, almost squirming and pushing him away as he settled into her chest

_Hormones,_ she reminded herself urgently, as her body curled into his hands; _raging hormones. And neurotransmitters_, she added in a muffled sigh, as his lips wandered down her neck, and he tucked his head sleepily into her shoulder. It was all just physics, she reminded herself, as her own fingers trailed automatically along his warm skin, his murmurs blending almost imperceptibly into hers, amid a familiar tangle of limbs.

"You'll have to dress up as Santa next year, you know," she noted, poking him again, just under the ribs. There was more of him there then there used to be, too, and she knew he'd blame the stress from the baby, and from his quest for double board certification, a rock star gold standard, and that he'd never admit she'd finally gotten it right with her sugar cookies, and that the evidence clung to him, resting right beneath her fingers.

"Never happen," he grumbled, squirming himself and almost pulling away from her wandering hands. He'd gotten the point already, weeks before, that he needed to hit the gym more, and couldn't wait until after the holidays, or his next round of certification exams, or it would just encourage her baking, which was freaking hopeless.

"She'll leave cookies for you," Meredith teased. "You know you love them."

"Taste like saw dust," he mumbled, shaking his head without even opening his eyes, a soft sigh escaping him as her fingers sank further into his flesh, almost as if she didn't quite care, just then, that he'd spent too much time at the latest cookie exchange.

He was sure that Emily would forgive her mother, though, and that she'd love Mere even if she was the only kid in her class whose mother wasn't asked to bake anything for fund raisers and birthday parties. He was sure their daughter would adore everything about her rock star mother – except her baking.

"You'd eat them for her," Meredith crooned.

He'd do anything for Emily, Meredith knew, which is why she had state of art smoke detectors in her nursery, and a car seat that rivaled anything in NASA's space shuttles, and the best pediatrician in Arizona – since he'd practically interviewed each one in the state – and a pediatric dentist on speed dial, though she had yet to cut her first tooth.

Probably just as well, though, Meredith thought, since if she had anything like his sweet tooth, she'd need one. The "if" made her shudder slightly, since she'd already seen hints of that smirk. But she was sure their daughter would forgive his hovering. She'd adore him, Meredith imagined, even if she never got the whole radioactive spider thing.

"What about science?" he protested sleepily. "She can believe in a fat guy in a red suit but not in giant spiders? That won't help her get into med school."

"She's not going to med school," Meredith objected sharply. "And she's not going to be the first girl wrestler at Iowa University, either" she added, rolling her eyes.

"She could," he pointed out. "She's got some grip." She could do anything, he imagined, since they were already saving for college, and she was pretty freaking coordinated for a three month old, and she was going to be gorgeous, and…

"I'm sure she'll come up with her own ideas," Meredith insisted, rolling her eyes again. She was not going to push her daughter; she had promised herself that from day one. No math lessons for infants, no bilingual preschool, no science camp for gifted toddlers, no Olympic training at age six, no anatomy mobile for above her crib – even if Cristina's baby had mastered the basic human skeleton, already, and Cristina had offered to send it.

"Plus she's brilliant," he observed, burrowing further under the comforter.

"How do you know that?" she scowled curiously. He'd protect her from every threat real or imagined, she realized months before, while she'd protect her from him. Well, from him, and the Stanford Medical Baby scrubs that Cristina had sent, and…

"I offered her one of your cookies," he said casually. "And she started to cry."

"It must have been the last one," she taunted, poking him again. "That's what you'd do."

"I promised her I'd protect her from them," he retorted, stifling a yawn.

"She's not driving a Hummer, either," Meredith insisted, settling back into her pillow, as her fingers absently traced his back, lingering in a well worn spot. He hadn't mentioned driving yet, but she was sure he'd already begun to consider her options.

"They're safe," he nodded, his mind automatically running through all the other things he'd need to defend her from, again: bad drivers, stray animals, pools – infant swimming lessons, she'd need infant swimming lessons – giant radioactive spiders, Mere's baking…

"You think we'll screw her up?" she asked quietly, after a long silence.

"Oh, yeah," he nodded, swallowing audibly.

"I've still got Dr. Wyatt's number in my old travel bag," she noted, tugging him closer, "if we need her."

"That brown bag that always smells like pears?" he mumbled half into his pillow, sighing quietly again as her hands continued along their familiar path.

"Um-huh," she agreed, settling closer into him.

"How'd that happen, anyway?" he asked tiredly, his arms tightening around her.

"Long story," she muttered into his chest, as she drifted off to sleep.


End file.
